ALREADY DANE & DUSTED
City too hot for Scott on debut COPENHAGEN..1 MAN CITY..3
BERNARDO SILVA is fast becoming Manchester City’s go-to guy on the big Champions League nights.
The non-stop Portuguese midfielder came up with another vital goal as Pep Guardiola’s European kings took a giant step towards the quarter-finals with an accomplished first-leg display against the slayers of Manchester united.
scotland defender scott McKenna had quite a baptism of fire on his Copenhagen debut, thrown straight in at the deep end against Erling Haaland and Co.
But silva – whose last eight goals in the competition have
all come in the knockout stages – was the difference maker again.
Copenhagen’s goal, a smart finish by debut-boy Magnus Mattsson to cancel out Kevin De Bruyne’s third-minute opener, only came courtesy of a terrible mistake by City keeper Ederson.
But Phil Foden added a third in stoppage time to give the scoreline a fairer reflection of the game.
De Bruyne said: “it’s tough. We’ve played here a couple of times and the atmosphere is great. We had to respect
them. We started really well. We made one mistake and they capitalised but we played really well.
“We scored the third goal and it’s a little bit of an advantage now.”
This was the Danish champions’ first competitive game for 63 days – and when they weren’t chasing shadows they were reduced to putting the boot in.
Diogo Goncalves’ cynical hack at Jack Grealish’s ankle forced the midfielder off after 20 minutes.
City are now unbeaten in 18 Champions League games. if they continue that run all the way to the Wembley final they will break the record held by sir Alex Ferguson’s united if they retain the trophy.
This tie could have been put to bed inside 10 minutes.
De Bruyne glanced a free header wide from close range and ruben Dias’ downward nod from six yards was scooped out by Copenhagen keeper Kamil Grabara.
The inevitable eventually happened when De Bruyne took Foden’s pass at a tight angle and, with defenders expecting a shot, the Belgian placed a measured shot in at the far post.
silva’s cross came back off the post after clipping the head of Denis Varro and Haaland then sprung into action with a scissors-kick that flew just over.
Yet, astonishingly, the home side were level in 34 minutes when Ederson’s woeful kick led to their first attack and Mattsson punished him with a deadly finish from 20 yards.
Guardiola’s men went ahead again on the stroke of half-time. De Bruyne’s block tackle on Mattsson forced the ball through to silva to flick a clever finish over Grabara.
City had marginally less control after the break but Foden scored a late third with an emphatic finish from De Bruyne’s cutback.