Pep Guardiola will always have points to prove with his magnificent Manchester City side, despite being the fastest manager in Premier League history to amass 500 points. In a tough and bruising encounter with a Southampton team that were more sinners than saints, Pep chalked up his 500th point in just his 213th top flight game, the only downside being he couldn’t make it to 502 at St Mary’s Stadium. […]

Matt Le Tissier is justifiably miffed that his beloved Southampton were cheated out of Manolo Gabbiadini’s perfectly valid goal in the League Cup Final. The former Saints star has joined the chorus calling for the introduction of video technology to prevent miscarriages of football justice, instances of which are all too common in the top flight of English football. Aggrieved Le Tissier said that had it been United scoring the disputed […]

Having beaten the champions of Germany in midweek, Manchester City finally – finally – decided to strut their stuff on the domestic stage and remind everyone just why they are the reigning champions of England. This was more like it – pace, precision passing and passion, a raw desire to ensure each Saint stayed tackled when tackled, and second balls were snapped up like flat screens TVs in a Black […]

Four wins in a demanding quartet of games would go a long way to decontaminating a season that many believe could yet become a toxic wasteland for Manchester City. Having lost their grip on the League Cup, they have fallen nine points behind domestic table-toppers Chelsea and progression in the Champions League depends on a do-or-die gladiator clash with the Romans next month. Up next are Southampton and Sunderland away, […]

Saturday lunchtime at the Etihad and Manchester City and Southampton served a familiar dish from the menu of football clichés in that, it is indeed ‘a funny old game’. City cooked up a winning recipe as they stayed on course for the Premier League title with a delicious 4-1 outcome, but it was an encounter packed with diverse flavourings and one that served to confuse the palate. The three-goal margin […]

It’s quite bizarre that Manchester City are still the bookies’ favourites for the Premier League title… surely Liverpool won it last Sunday didn’t they, when they demolished Spurs 4-0? Oh, I’m sorry the Scousers haven’t actually won it yet… but you’d never believe it from the scenes at Anfield and the media’s sycophantic slobbering all over Brendan Rodgers and the ubiquitous ‘Stevie Gee’. For Premier League chief Richard Scudamore, it […]

It all started so brightly. Swift, incisive passing play, Sergio Aguero’s 18th goal of the season, Southampton on the back foot and the usually vociferous St Mary’s crowd well and truly silenced. It ended with Manchester City hanging on to an extremely hard earned draw as a patched up Saints team, full of unfamiliar names, was roared on by the raw guttural fanaticism of the less than saintly home support. […]

It was a case of Sin City last time Manchester’s boys in blue went up against the Saints as Mancini’s men virtually gift wrapped the title for the Trafford troglodytes. The 3-1 defeat at St Mary’s was typified by a Joe Hart howler and a gorgeous Gareth Barry right foot strike…past the aforementioned City keeper, in City’s poorest ‘performance’ of a disappointing defence of their Premier League crown. Irony of […]

Manchester City’s thoroughbreds played like a bunch of donkeys as Southampton wasted no time looking gift horses in the mouth, with Roberto Mancini’s men never at the races. On this showing, City’s stable of champions would be better off served in a Findus lasagne or Tesco beefburger, such was the horrible taste left in the mouth after an utterly abject performance. Instead of heading back to the Etihad, City’s entourage […]