City seemed disinterested in the first half too. Mancini probably gave them a kicking in the dressing room not wanting it to get embarrassing. They were somewhat redeemed.
Secretly i think City fans might not be too worried about going out. After seeing United go out they will be happy to focus on just the league, because for now realistically that is what City desperately wanted this season. Finishing above United would be a long standing dream come true.
One of the Manchester clubs will finish without a trophy. Neither will be happy about it, but i think the pressure has to be more on Mancini and City to make sure it isn't them considering their outlay.
It is the weakest United side i would say in at least 8 years, and the best City side in 40. Despite the disruptions earlier in the season City's form has dropped now. United have battled through countless injuries. If City don't take it then they can only blame themselves.
I thought City played great in the second half. Looked too lazy in the first, and Harts chance at the end I thought was in. If you take anything away from this match and Utd's is that City have more drive about them. Utd were rubbish all evening last night, City redeemed themselves in the second half.
Deserved to go out on the first half showing. Much better in the second half and thought Joe had nicked it right at the end :(
These Portuguese teams sure know how to dive and waste time though. Porto were at it non-stop over both legs and Sporting were an absolute joke last night with their pitiful feigning of injury and time wasting, should have been about 7 mins added time not the 5 that was given.
First of all, I'm from Portugal and I'm a Sporting fan, but this doesn't mean that what I say won't be the truth.
The first game was very important for us, before the game the comments made by City players were pretty bad, they thought that Sporting would be a walk in the park, well, we weren't. Ricardo Sá Pinto is coaching the team since mid-February if I'm not mistaken and to be honest, Sporting was pretty bad until he steped in. At first he did everything like the previous couch, just one thing different, his way of motivating the players! I bet you that when Sporting players are going to that locker room they are nervous and shaking like little girls, they have a lot of respect for Sá Pinto and the motivation that he passes on to them is just what the team needed. Even after the first game I don't think City player realized what could happen and they played the 2nd game like they had already passed, and we scored. The 2nd half was pretty bad for us, not only did we suffer a lot but we almost lost in the last second!
As for time wasting, let me tell you that Sá Pinto is very demanding, he steped in, he did 2 training sessions and in the next game, 60 minutes in a LOT of players, and I mean a lot because it was almost the whole team was on the floor, not wasting time, but completely exausted with a lot of muscle cramps.
In this game we didn't waste time, Patricio is hurt in his right knee and sometimes he can't even kick a ball, Izmailov has a lot of knee problems, same goes to Reffren, and Pereirinha suffered a dislocation in his left shoulder, so no, he wasn't faking anything when Nigel De Jong tried to carry him out of the pitch. The only time that you can say thay we wasted time was in the last 5 minutes of the game, Reffren spent like a minute and a half just keeping the ball with him and when he won that fould I couldn't stop laughing, sure it isn't all that good for the game, but what the hell, we wanted to send City out of the league and we only did what had to be done.
Well, at least city lost too. Kind of strange to see both Manchester clubs bounce out of the CL and Europa on the same days.
I thought City played great in the second half. Looked too lazy in the first, and Harts chance at the end I thought was in. If you take anything away from this match and Utd's is that City have more drive about them. Utd were rubbish all evening last night, City redeemed themselves in the second half.
Deserved to go out on the first half showing. Much better in the second half and thought Joe had nicked it right at the end :(
These Portuguese teams sure know how to dive and waste time though. Porto were at it non-stop over both legs and Sporting were an absolute joke last night with their pitiful feigning of injury and time wasting, should have been about 7 mins added time not the 5 that was given.