Manchester City 6-0 Chelsea: 3 Takeaways
Manchester City thrashed Chelsea 6-0 in a one-sided match at the Etihad yesterday to go to the top of the league table with 65 points from 27 matches. 2nd placed Liverpool also have 65 points, but City boasts of a superior goal difference. However, Liverpool have one game in hand and the title race between those two promises to turn out as one of the best in Premier League’s history.
City scored 4 goals within the first 25 minutes and made a mockery of the match in the first half itself. They added two more in the second half and completed the demolition job. Sergio Aguero scored a hattrick, the wonderful Raheem Sterling added two more and Ilkay Gundogan rounded off the tally. It was also sweet revenge for City, as they avenged their 0-2 loss against Chelsea in December.
Pep Guardiola’s side continues to be supremely dominant in their home ground, as they toyed with Chelsea last night to leave the 2016-17 league champions wounded and humiliated. It was a clinical annihilation that leaves Maurizio Sarri’s position in jeopardy and did considerable damage to Chelsea’s prospects of finishing inside the top 4. It was Chelsea’s heaviest defeat since they lost 0-7 to Nottingham Forest in 1991.
We would now take a look at the 3 takeaways from the match.
#1 The positional play of City players was too good for Chelsea
City had 56% ball-possession in yesterday’s match, which is not staggering by their standards. However, when they had the ball, they did far more damage with their precise and astute passing and intelligent positional play.
Sergio Aguero scored his 11th hattrick to equal Alan Shearer’s record feat, and strengthened his claim to be the most clinical striker inside the penalty box since Romario. He has now scored 23 goals this season and 222 overall for City. Yesterday’s hattrick, however, was a testimony to his shooting prowess too, as he scored a scorcher with a 25-yard shot from outside the penalty box.
Chelsea’s defenders and defensive midfielders found it almost impossible to mark the City players, as they frequently changed their positions to keep the fluidity of their game intact. The City players’ off-the-ball play was too lethal and sophisticated for the sluggish Chelsea defence and they kept making inroads with their slippery runs.
Aguero got into the perfect scoring position to score his first goal from a misplaced headed back-pass from Ross Barkley, while Sterling ran into empty spaces inside the penalty box to score both his goals.