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An early Phil Foden header yesterday gave Manchester City a 1-0 victory against Tottenham Hotspur and took the Citizens back to the top of the Premier League standings.
The win, which gives City some revenge for a painful Champions League exit at the hands of Spurs midweek, sees them with a two-point lead over Liverpool, which could, however, return to first place again with a victory at Cardiff later today.
Both coaches made a number of changes to their line-up from the thrilling 4-3 victory for City against Spurs midweek that still saw them being knocked out on the away-goal rule.
Mauricio Pochettino packed his defence, bringing in Davinson Sánchez, Juan Foyth and Ben Davies to boost the five-man backline, while goalkeeper and captain Hugo Lloris was given a rest. His place was taken by Paulo Gazzaniga.
The final change was Eric Dier, who was given a starting place in central midfield.
Pochettino’s counterpart, Pep Guardiola, also made three changes, taking out Vincent Kompany and Benjamin Mendy in defence and bringing in John Stones and Oleksandr Zinchenko.
Foden started in only his second Premier League match, taking the place of David Silva in midfield.
And it was the 18-year-old who broke the deadlock early on with an easy header. Silva found an unmarked Sergio Agüero, but instead of going for goal himself, the Argentine international headed across the area to Foden, who scored from close range.
Although he has scored in other competitions, it was Foden’s first Premier League goal.
Foden, who is a product of the Manchester City Academy, said he was proud to play in such a good team. “I am an attacking midfielder and I try to get into the box, because that is where you score goals. I was happy that when the opportunity came, I was there.”
The goal spurred the visitors into action and City’s goalkeeper Ederson was called upon to pull off a number of close-range saves to deny Spurs. In the 14th minute the Brazilian saved from Christian Eriksen, who had found a way through the area for a one-on-one with the goalkeeper.
Shortly afterwards it was the two-goal hero from Wednesday, Son Heung-min who was through, but again Ederson denied the striker.
Guardiola’s game plan suffered a setback in the 37th minute, when Kevin de Bruyne had to be replaced by Fernandinho after picking up an injury.
City had their second penalty appeal turned down shortly after the restart when Foden had gone to the ground following a Foyth challenge, but the referee waved play on.
Spurs, meanwhile, thought they should have received a penalty with about 20 minutes to go, as Stones seemed to handle Son’s cross, but the referee again would have none of it.
Within a minute it was Raheem Sterling who should have doubled his side’s lead after substitute Leroy Sané found the England international. Sterling, who was standing just 5.5m from the goal line, thought he had done enough to score, but Gazzaniga pulled off a sensational stop by sticking out his leg, blocking the shot.
That was to be the last real chance of the game as the match ended 1-0 to the home side.
Silva, who won the man of the match award, but gave it to Foden, said he felt that the crowd had again been fully behind them.
“We wanted to give a response and we wanted to keep the title race alive. We managed both. It was a great win and three points, now we need four wins from our remaining games.”
