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ALVAREZ DAZZLES AS CITY PUT
MANCHESTER City had been in a holding pattern – held by Nottingham Forest, held by RB Leipzig – but landed with a victory that was Club Class comfortable.
No turbulence, no stray baggage, no drama – as goals from Julian Alvarez, Erling Haaland, Phil Foden and an own goal by Chris Mepham checked them in, two points behind Arsenal.
The leaders have a game in hand, but any thoughts that Pep Guardiola’s side were feeling travel weary were not in evidence on the south coast.
Bournemouth did manage a late reply through Jefferson Lerma, but the very last significant word belonged to City as their players went across to give sustained applause to their fans.
Some of them had been to Arsenal, Nottingham, Germany and now Dorset in four successive away trips and the celebrations felt like gratitude rather than triumphalism. “We spoke about doing that with the fans when we were in the dressing room,” said Guardiola.
“It takes a big contribution to come here, big sacrifices for them and their families. We wanted to show them respect. Our away supporters are incredible.”
This was the perfect fixture for City to get back on track and for Haaland to end a meagre return of one goal in six games.
Bournemouth were not backs-to-the-wall broken and cowed. With four points from two games in their sails, they attacked throughout – leaving leaky gaps which the champions ruthlessly exposed.
“It was important to get back to winning games,” added Guardiola.
“I am very pleased with what I have seen every day in training recently.
“We have played a lot of hard away games, with a lot of travel and short recovery. But we still had the desire to come here and win.” On a surface so heavily watered by the home club, City refused to be slowed up. They went ahead after 16 minutes. Ilkay Gudogan’s neat pitch found Foden in the penalty area, but his attempt was blocked by the onrushing Neto.
Haaland’s eyes lit up when the ball dropped on a plate, but his effort was also deflected – on to the crossbar – and it was left to Alvarez to fire the rebound into the roof of the net.
City then opened up Bournemouth for a second time, with even more ease, and went 2-0 ahead through Haaland – his 27th of the season. Nathan Ake began the slick move which was taken on by Gundogan, before Foden’s calm and clever knockdown gave the striker the easiest of opportunities.
Bournemouth countered with their best spell as Lerma sent a shot spiralling over and Adam Smith thumped another that was blocked. But the relief was only temporary and the pain soon returned, self-inflicted this
time by Philip Billing. His careless pass across his own box had “eat me” stamped all over it and Foden quickly gobbled it up to make it 3-0.
Bournemouth kept the door shut until half-time, but they put a foot wrong six minutes after the re-start when a shot from Alvarez – that was going wide – was deflected into his own goal by Mepham.
Lerma grabbed a deserved goal when he volleyed in after Ruben Dias had overstretched, but the hosts remain in the relegation zone
“Apart from the scoreline, I thought we made it fairly uncomfortable for Manchester City. There was a lot to be positive about.
Cherries boss Gary O’neil said: “We could definitely be better.
“But it was probably one of the highest amount of chances we have created this season.
“I thought the supporters remained well behind the players, which shows what they thought of the performance.”