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Dele Alli scores, Manchester City v Tottenham Hotspur
Claudio Bravo tries in vain to prevent Dele Alli scoring for Tottenham to pull his side back to 2-1 down. The Chilean would go on to concede another as City threw away a two-goal lead. Photograph: Oli Scarff/AFP/Getty Images
Claudio Bravo tries in vain to prevent Dele Alli scoring for Tottenham to pull his side back to 2-1 down. The Chilean would go on to concede another as City threw away a two-goal lead. Photograph: Oli Scarff/AFP/Getty Images

Claudio Bravo still in the spotlight despite clangers from Spurs’ Hugo Lloris

This article is more than 7 years old
at the Etihad Stadium
The theory was that Manchester City look vulnerable unless they score the first goal but despite scoring the first two they managed to end up with only a point against Tottenham in an exciting 2-2 draw at the Etihad

Claudio Bravo was the goalkeeper under pressure going into this match; Hugo Lloris was the one who ended up going to pieces. While Manchester City’s last line of defence did not exactly redeem his reputation, Tottenham’s goalkeeping was the greater influence on the game, with Lloris responsible for two errors in quick succession at the start of the second half.

The only slight good news for Pep Guardiola, whose top four hopes are fading by the week, is that, regardless of goalkeeping, City actually deserved to win this game. Placing their faith in attack and creating far more chances than their high-flying opponents, City could and probably should have been out of sight even before Lloris lent them a hand, and they were harshly denied a penalty before Spurs drew level.

Guardiola dropped John Stones after the hiding at Everton last week but kept faith with the much-maligned Bravo in goal, returning Pablo Zabaleta to his rightful position at right-back and asking Yaya Touré to be the defensive screen behind a particularly attack‑minded midfield four. Against an in-form side on a six-match winning run who had scored four goals on two occasions already this month that could be considered brave, positive and principled, or alternatively it might be viewed as asking for trouble.

The latest theory surrounding City’s staggering inconsistency this season, one that Guardiola himself seems to partly acknowledge, is that they need to score the first goal. If their early attacking efforts bear fruit, their superior passing and movement will bring further goals against opponents obliged to come forward, and all will be well. Should they fail to score inside the first half-hour or so, however, as happened in the 4-0 defeat at Goodison, they are quite likely to go behind to the first shot Bravo is supposed to save and then chaos might result. Or, as Guardiola explained it in the match programme: “Everton arrived once and scored a goal. In the second half they scored another and that was so tough mentally for the players.”

Just remember who started all this. Mauricio Pochettino spent his pre‑match press conference bigging his side up as “warriors”. City thought they were hiring the best football coach in the world, not a psychology expert. If City are unable to recover from going a goal down one wonders if there is any point in them even hoping they might overhaul their Premier League points deficit in this most competitive of seasons.

Except Guardiola initially seemed to be on to something with his theorising and his attacking ideas. Spurs looked anything but warriors in a one-sided first half in which a dominant City reached double figures for clear chances created. True, they did not accept any of them, which was worrying, but there was only one side even trying to score in the first period. Once again, hardly any opportunities fell Sergio Agüero’s way, which is another thing City need to work on, but before the interval Raheem Sterling, Zabaleta, Kevin De Bruyne and Leroy Sané all failed to stick away decent chances. Lloris, meanwhile, was not beaten by the opposition’s first attempt on target. He saved well from David Silva midway through the first half and was kept quite busy afterwards, keeping out shots from Agüero and Sterling.

Spurs did not have any shots on target in the first half, so the alleged weakness of Bravo in that regard could not be put to the test. One might have thought the visitors would send in a few speculative efforts just for the hell of it, yet rather surprisingly they left him alone, content to see most of their attacks fizzle out harmlessly on the edge of the penalty area. Spurs had still not managed to test Bravo by the time they went behind early in the second half, a combination of Eric Dier’s switch to centre-back and Lloris’s unconvincing heading ability helping to conjure that rarity, a comedy goal at the Etihad for which City were not responsible. Five minutes later the home side’s lead was doubled through another goalkeeping gift, Lloris failing to hold on to Sterling’s cross.

It looked as though Bravo was well and truly off the hook, yet an unhappy sequence continued when Spurs pulled a goal back on the hour. Dele Alli did exceptionally well to convert a cross that took a slight deflection off Aleksandar Kolarov on its way from Kyle Walker, but the inescapable fact for City was that no sooner had Spurs managed an attempt on target than a goal had resulted. The situation worsened for the home side when Tottenham drew level, not just because Son Heung-min’s goal was from their second attempt on target, but because Sterling had just been refused a clear penalty after an obvious push by Walker.

Lloris was able to come to his side’s rescue in the closing minutes with a fine save from Agüero but City cannot keep saying they were unlucky. Never mind the theories, the message here was a familiar one in the end. City were frustrated by a side that created only a couple of chances, but took them.

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