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Manchester City’s struggle continues as they had to come from behind twice to avoid a fifth defeat of the season against Crystal Palace.
It was to City’s advantage when the Merseyside derby was postponed at lunchtime due to severe storm, it was an opportunity for the defending champions to close the gap on league leaders Liverpool to six points with a victory, but in the end it was an opportunity blew off as they needed equalisers from Erling Haaland and then Rico Lewis late into the game to salvage a point off Crystal Palace. Pep Guardiola’s men now sit eight points adrift of the table toppers in fourth.
Crystal Palace raced into an early lead courtesy of Daniel Munoz fourth minute opener after connecting to Will Hughes’ smart pass that splitted City’s defence. The host had a couple of chances to double their lead through Jefferson Larma and Ismaila Sarr but weren’t so lucky and were pegged back by Erling Haaland’s powerful header right on the half-hour mark to restore parity.
The visitors came so close to turning the game on its head before halftime but failed to utilize any of the clear cut chances and instead, right at the start of the second half went behind again when Lacroix leapt above the rooted Kyle Walker to head in Palace’s second.
Manchester City’s fluidity in play after going behind soon got rewarded with De Bruyne and Bernardo Silva combining to play in Rico Lewis for a clever finish. It was his third in the Premier League and all of them have come against Crystal Palace. Unfortunately, City’s to-be hero on the evening turned villain after being controversially sent off by Ref Rob Jones after a second yellow card, denying the VAR any intervention being a yellow-card call.
Pep Guardiola must now put that disappointing outing behind him, with the Manchester Derby at the Etihad up next in the Premier League.
