JACK AND Greal happy to kickstart
JACK GREALISH has confessed that he likes to take a bit of a kicking. He reckons it makes him play better.
Maybe that’s why Pep Guardiola gave his £100million midfielder the nod at Molineux after a week when the boot really went in over Grealish’s failure to give Manchester City enough bang for their buck.
It certainly worked. Perhaps Pep knows best, hey?
In fact, it took Grealish just 53 seconds to repay his manager’s faith and answer the critics.
And how he enjoyed doing it in front of fans who will always have him down as a bona fide Villan.
Phil Foden and Kevin De Bruyne combined down the right in City’s first attack.
And although De Bruyne’s low cross was too strong for Erling Haaland as he arrived at the near post, it was perfect for
Grealish to steer home his first goal of the season.
Injuries meant this was only his second Premier League start of the campaign.
But Grealish scored just six times and conjured up only four assists after arriving from Aston Villa last summer.
He knows that he will have to beef up those stats if he wants to be taken seriously in Guardiola’s star-studded team.
The Brummie certainly played his part back on familiar West Midlands soil as City moved top of the table with some ease.
Wolves were forced to play the last hour with 10 men after Nathan Collins was sent off for an ugly challenge on Grealish that threatened to cut him off at the hip. But by then it was virtually game over.
Haaland had strode forward like a marauding Viking, ponytail flapping behind him, to put
City two up in the 16th minute. The Norwegian certainly isn’t struggling to live up to the hype and hysteria.
This was his 14th goal of a season that is already starting to look ominous for the rest of the top flight.
Haaland threatened to add to his impressive tally every time he got a sight of Wolves keeper Jose Sa.
And he also showed he is a maker as well as a taker of goals by brilliantly linking up with De Bruyne as the Belgian provided the cross for Foden to score in
the second half. With Ruben Neves dropping back to play as an emergency centre-back after Collins’ departure, Bruno Lage would have been worried that the beating could have become the kind of battering that might cost a manager their job.
But with City playing in second gear after the break, they only added Foden’s smartly worked goal in the 69th minute.
Soon afterwards, Guardiola (right) sent on Ilkay Gundogan, Riyad Mahrez and Julian
Alvarez as substitutes. Talk about flexing your muscles.
When Grealish was later replaced by teenager Cole Palmer, he left with a smile on his face and a wave to the Wolves fans on the South Bank giving him grief.
Molineux paid tribute to the Queen before kick-off with a silence that was observed impeccably by those fans who had taken their seats.
Unfortunately, it was broken by some City supporters who had opted for one more pint on the concourse and without the brains to realise the ceremony was taking place.
Wolves were one of English football’s giants when the Queen’s reign began 70 years ago.
The Old Gold lifted three championships during the 1950s and a statue of skipper Billy Wright stands outside the famous old stadium as a reminder of those times.
In 1952, Collins might have got the benefit of the doubt for the gruesome challenge that poleaxed Grealish.
He pleaded to referee
Anthony
Taylor that when he smashed into the England man’s stomach with all six studs it was accidental.
It may have been. But in the modern game it was a red card every day of the week and twice on a Saturday lunchtime.
Grealish took the trouble to lift up his shirt to show off the damage to home supporters who were suggesting he was faking it.
He looked like the real deal.