Manchester City: Arnautovic shines in 2-0 victory over Citizens
By Larry Henry
On Saturday, Manchester City were given their second straight Barclays Premier League defeat, as they lost to Stoke City 2-0 at the Britannia Stadium. Manuel Pellegrini‘s squad now have lost three of their last five matches in all competitions.
Stoke’s Marko Arnautovic gave the hosts an early 1-0 lead after Xherdan Shaqiri found the Austrian with a brilliant cross in the box. Arnautovic met the cross with his right-foot and the shot beat Joe Hart for an opening goal.
The Austrian Arnautovic soon doubled the hosts lead, after Shaqiri played him in with a beautiful through ball that the forward finished with a shot to the bottom left-hand corner. After 15 minutes, Stoke had themselves a 2-0 lead on the league-leaders.
Nicolas Otamendi, Wilfried Bony, and Aleksandar Kolarov all had first-half chances to cut the lead in half, but all couldn’t capitalize on their chances. Pellegrini’s group went into the halftime break, down 2-0 on the road.
In the second half, Manchester City continued to try to break down the Stoke City defense, however they couldn’t muster anything that could beat Jack Butland in the Potters goal.
After 90 minutes, Stoke City had themselves a convincing home win that will move them up to 9th place in the Barclays Premier League table, pending the results from the other action this weekend. Manchester City with the defeat, have fallen from the top spot of the Barclays Premier League table and could fall as low as 5th before the weekends end.
Mark Hughes‘ team made the most of their chances, scoring twice on four shots that reached Joe Hart in net. Arnautovic now has scored five league goals in 14 appearances this season. The Swiss international Shaqiri now has three assists in 12 BPL appearances this season.
Manchester City were able to have 53% of the possession, but only forced Butland to make four saves in 11 total chances this season. Sergio Aguero, Yaya Toure, and Vincent Kompany all were out for Pellegrini today after dealing with injury problems.
According to Daily Mail, today marked the first brace scored by Marko Arnautovic since his arrival from Inter Milan in 2013. For Stoke to continue their improvement up the table, Hughes will need the Austrian to put in more performances like today’s.
Manchester City will look to bounce back quickly, as they face Swansea City at the Etihad Stadium next Saturday in BPL play, after their final Champions League group-stage match this Tuesday against Borussia Monchengladbach.
Stoke will look to build off today’s win, as they travel to the Boleyn Ground next Saturday to face Slaven Bilic‘s West Ham.