CITIZENS SURVIVE LATE SCARE
Man City withstand Watford onslaught to move five points clear
PEP GUARDIOLA called on Manchester City to learn from a nervy finish to a seventh straight Premier League victory as a 2-1 win at Watford moved the champions five points clear of Liverpool at the top of the table.
City’s goals came either side of half-time as Leroy Sane chested home before Riyad Mahrez doubled the visitors’ lead early in the second period.
However, despite dominating for the majority of the game, Guardiola’s men had to withstand a nervy finish after Abdoulaye Doucoure bundled in five minutes from time.
“We have in mind the last minutes, (in) the last minutes anything could happen,” said Guardiola. “I think we played 65-70 minutes at a top, top level.
“After 0-2 we lost a little bit our control. We suffered, but that is what it is.
Guardiola made six changes to his starting line-up despite also missing Sergio Aguero and Kevin De Bruyne through injury.
Yet, City were still too strong for the dogged hosts with Watford thankful to goalkeeper Ben Foster for the visitors not racking up the 5-0 and 6-0 thrashings they did on their two previous visits to Vicarage Road.
City finally broke through five minutes before the break when Mahrez’s cross picked out Sane unmarked at the back post and he cleverly used his chest to power the ball below Foster.
Six minutes into the second half, the visitors struck again when Gabriel Jesus — who endured another lean night in front of goal in the absence of Aguero — at least made a contribution as a provider by pulling the ball back for Mahrez to fire home.
City got uncharacteristically slack in the final quarter, though, and were made to pay when Doucoure finally turned home after a goalmouth scramble.
Guardiola was forced to throw on Laporte and Nicolas Otamendi in the closing stages to repel Watford’s aerial assault, but City held on.
“They have dominated the game, they have created a lot of chances but I think we have done very good work and, at the end in the last minutes, we had some set pieces to try and get another result,” added Gracia.
Elsewhere, Bournemouth moved above Manchester United up to sixth courtesy of a 2-1 win over Huddersfield thanks to early goals from Callum Wilson and Ryan Fraser to end a run of four straight defeats.