Manchester City moved to within a point of Premier League leaders Liverpool with a 1-0 victory at Bournemouth on Saturday evening.
Phil Foden scored the winning goal midway through the first half and the visitors had to dig in deep to secure their victory on the south coast.
The Cherries did immensely well to stay in the game and ramped up the pressure on City late on but they couldn’t quite carve out enough clear openings.
How the game unfolded
City should have taken the lead inside the opening ten minutes. Bernardo Silva dropped deep into his own box to collect the ball and play it long for Foden, who flicked it into the path of Erling Haaland, and he somehow fired wide when bearing down on goal.
Straight back down the other end, Ederson had to be at full stretch to deny Milos Kerkez’s long-range drive.
With 24 minutes on the clock, City broke the deadlock. A clever dink over the Bournemouth backline from Mateo Kovacic found Haaland, whose bouncing half-volley was pushed aside by Neto, but only into the path of Foden to tap into an empty net.
After the break, Bournemouth came close to finding a leveller. Antoine Semenyo broke at pace down the right and skipped past the stumbling Nathan Ake, with his cross deflecting into the path of Marcus Tavernier, but his skewed effort was cleared in time by Ruben Dias.
Tavernier then fired wide after Dominic Solanke did incredibly well to hold the ball up in the City penalty area as Bournemouth’s push for an equaliser continued.
Ederson produced a fine save to deny Solanke at the back post from a wicked Tavernier corner, with replays showing the ball was close to crossing the line.
Haaland’s struggles in front of goal continued having burst into the box, only for Kerkez’s last-ditch slide challenge to put him off and the chance went begging.
As the game headed into six minutes of added time, Bournemouth thought they were on level terms. Semenyo’s cross picked out substitute Enes Unal – who spent two years on City’s books – but his header bounced off the post.
City survived those six minutes to claim three precious points in the title race.
GK: Neto – 4/10 – Set Bournemouth up to fail with a parry right into Foden’s path for the opener. Failed to claim a few crosses and looked nervy throughout.
RB: Adam Smith – 6/10 – Let out a puff of the cheeks upon seeing Doku was entering the field of play. Did fairly well to clamp down Nunes at least.
CB: Illia Zabarnyi – 5/10 – A couple of hairy…
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