CITY FIRE SILVA BULLETS
City will face much tougher tests in the Champions League, but proved a point to doubting Guardiola
Shakhtar 0 Man City 3 FROM JEREMY CROSS
CITY stormed to the top of Group F with a clinical Champions League win in Kharkiv.
David Silva, Aymeric Laporte and Bernardo Silva scored for Pep Guardiola’s men who were
MANCHESTER CITY showed their class in Kharkiv to take a giant step towards the knockout stages.
The Premier League champions will face much sterner tests than this in the competition this season.
But on this showing City might just go on to prove doubting boss Pep Guardiola wrong following his cautious claim that his side aren’t special enough to become kings of Europe.
There was something special about them in the OSK Metalist Stadium after dismantling Shakhtar Donetsk with some clinical attacking football that saw them win the contest before half-time.
David Silva (right) was irresistible and opened the scoring on 30 minutes before Aymeric Laporte doubled the lead five minutes later.
Sub Bernardo Silva completed the rout on 70 minutes with his first touches of the game. The hosts were outclassed as City lived up to their billing as Champions League favourites – even if Guardiola doesn’t agree.
He recalled Kevin De Bruyne for his first start since helping Belgium beat England in the World Cup third-place play-off in St Petersburg.
Having lost at home to Lyon last month, City could ill-afford more slip-ups against a team riding high at the top of the Ukrainian Premier League.
Shakhtar had never lost a home match against an English side in European competition and beat City 2-1 in the group stages last season to join them in the knockout rounds.
But a repeat of that result here would have been a shock considering Guardiola’s men arrived in Kharkiv having lost just once this season. Paulo Fonseca’s men were also without influential midfield duo Marlos and Taison and City wasted no time in looking to take full advantage. Silva almost opened the scoring when his overhead kick hit the crossbar.
He sent Gabriel Jesus racing through but Andriy Pyatov was quick off his line to smother the Brazilian’s shot. Riyad Mahrez was the next to blow a golden chance, shooting wide after City had broken from inside their own penalty box to cut the Shakhtar defence to ribbons, before seeing another effort blocked on his own line by Yaroslav Rakitskiy. The pressure from City was non-stop, with Silva hitting the post and Jesus blazing the rebound high and wide before Raheem Sterling curled an effort off-target. If Guardiola had some hair, he would have been pulling it out.
But all the frustration was forgotten when Benjamin Mendy and Jesus combined to set up Silva, who arrowed a low volley into the bottom corner to fire City ahead.
The only question now seemed to be how many more Guardiola’s men would get – and another goal soon arrived when the unmarked Laporte headed home De Bruyne’s corner to make it 2-0.
The game was over as a contest long ago, but ruthless City showed no let-up in their hunt for more goals.
Silva, Jesus and Mahrez missed further chances as Shakhtar continued to ride their luck. But it didn’t seem to matter on a night when Guardiola could send on the guile of Barnardo with 20 minutes remaining.
The Portugal star wasted no time in making his mark, charging forward towards a flagging Shakhtar defence before drilling a low shot into the corner to finish off a professional job from a team that will take some stopping.