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There was a moment in the second half when Pep Guardiola paused in the midst of whatever torment routinely grips him during the course of a match to throw an arm around Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and briefly acknowledge the occasional absurdities of a life in this game.
The most famous manager in the world was watching his Manchester City team lose a grip on the Premier League title they have won for two seasons running with an aura of invincibility that has slipped badly of late.
They have dropped eight points in their last five games but it is hard to put just a numerical measure on a defeat like this, when at times the Guardiola machine looked slow and vulnerable and – worst of all for their manager – were beaten by a younger, braver side.
This was a magnificent derby game on the pitch, where it was played right on the edge. Whatever came from the stands, both sides reflected the great long-standing rivalry, and the standard was high. Later Guardiola would suggest that United’s counter-attacking style was less noble than his approach to the game, and that his team had dominated the ball. But these are the challenges that champions face and the gap to league leaders Liverpool is now an enormous one.
No club have ever won an English top-flight title from 14 points behind, as City now are from Liverpool, and Guar- diola was reminded afterwards that this is the lowest points return that he has ever taken in his managerial career after 16 games of a season.
He is right about City’s dominance – 72 per cent possession, 22 attempts on goal – but there was still something missing, that old inevitability that they would find a way through.
They were skewered on a marvellous counter-attacking performance from United who scored early, through Marcus Rashford’s penalty, and then minutes later through Anthony Martial before they got to grips with their rivals and fought their way through the final hour of the game.
But what City lacked was in the fine margins: Aaron Wan-Bissaka largely controlled Raheem Sterling, Angelino lived in fear of the pace of Daniel James.
For Solskjaer this was his first backto-back league win since March, four days in which he has beaten the teams of Jose Mourinho and now Guardiola.
He wants to convince the world that he has the right answers to the six-year problem of United but most of all he wants to convince his players. For the likes of James, Scott McTominay and Wan-Bissaka this was a breakthrough game. The same might be said for Fred, “arguably man of the match” said Solskjaer against a side he routinely described as the best in the world.
In the VIP seats Sir Alex Ferguson applauded a great United win that was based on a fluent counter-attack against a City defence that was sufficiently hesitant to make such an approach worthwhile. It was a vintage first half for United, in which they played with the confidence of a side that had spotted a weakness in their old rivals and just needed to press in the right places. Later, Solskjaer was reluctant to call it counter attacking, preferring instead “attacking flowing football with the right intent.”
They were a goal to the good on 23 minutes and the second came six minutes later when there were six blue shirts in the home area and not one could stop Martial turning and shooting. His goal came amid a burst of chances which left City rocking. Guardiola would later talk about failing to “control the counter attack” but it was much more visceral than that.
City were failing to control the game, and their defence looked shot. John Stones would come off injured in the second half to be replaced by Nicolas Otamendi whose late, powerfully headed goal set up a fierce finish.
Asked whether it was the best United performance of his year in charge, Solskjaer seemed to agree, “when you consider who we are playing,” he said, “and where we are playing.”
He pointed out that his team had one fewer day to recover from the midweek fixtures and what effect that had.
“We have had to reshape the squad and change the culture and change the way we want to play,” he said looking back on the year. “When you prepare for these games to watch so many [past matches]… it’s not nice to see that City are so much better.”
This time United were at their best in the moments when they wasted no time. Just a minute after the first goal they went up the pitch in three passes – James, Jesse Lingard, Fred and then finally to Rashford, hitting the shot first time when he might have taken another touch. But that was the mood of United in that short period when it felt, for them, like anything was possible.
Video assistant referee Michael Oliver had given United the penalty, which Anthony Taylor had inexplicably missed on 20 minutes. Bernardo Silva came in from Rashford’s left as the striker slipped through the penalty area traffic, his eyes on the United man and clipping the striker’s left leg. Rashford sent Ederson the wrong way from the spot for his 13th goal in 14 games for club and country. By that point Ederson had already made good saves from Lingard and Martial.
City wanted a penalty for a handball against Fred in first-half stoppage time but the official VAR verdict was that it did not meet the criteria for a handball when a player is falling, as the midfielder was. It is not handball, according to the laws of the game, when the hand or arm is between body and the ground to support the falling body.
“Next season we will be better – and luckier,” Guardiola said, suggesting that he thought it should be different.
Some City fans had already left when Otamendi headed in his fellow substitute Riyad Mahrez’s corner with five regulation minutes remaining.
The Argentine had carried Wan-Bissaka along with him on his surge onto the ball, the United full-back caught out for the first time all afternoon and unable to get himself fully set to prevent the run.
There had been a great David de Gea save from Rodri, and a Victor Lindelof block on a Kevin De Bruyne shot too. These are the moments, in the past, when City have come through to win but not this time, and not often enough in recent weeks.