SUNDERLAND 1, MANCHESTER CITY 0
Roberto Mancini wasn’t overly concerned by Manchester City’s defeat to a hardworking Sunderland side who have caused him problems ever since he arrived in England
“It’s the same story for us at Sunderland every year. We didn’t win here last season either but we won the league.” said City’s manager who has suffered 1-0 defeats on each of the last three visits.
The Italian was more frustrated by City’s profligacy in front of goal once again declaring that City would have to start scoring earlier and first to give them a better chance of winning games and City wasted a host of first half chances which would have settled their nerves.
“Sometimes we take one touch too many. We missed five or six chances in the first half and we need to score first in games sometimes. We can’t recover all the time.”
Adam Johnson scored the only goal of the game against his old club as City slipped up at the Stadium of Light and conceded vital points in the race to retain the Premier League title.
Johnson struck eight minutes into the second half when he received the ball from Stephane Sessegnon, cut in from the right and launched a speculative left footed strike which Joe Hart, who had earlier saved superbly from Steven Fletcher, will feel he could have done better with after it span into the goal off his gloves.
The Mackems defended their lead stoutly against a City side lacking width yet still able to carve out chances to score as Vincent Kompany hit the bar with a header while Simon Mignolet denied Yaya Toure and David Silva early on and Sergio Aguero and Edin Dzeko later.
City are now seven points off the pace but the January transfer windows looms and Mancini may opt to make some changes to try and push City back into the title race.