Manchester City got their new Champions League campaign off to a losing start in Munich, as they succumbed to a late winner from Pep Guardiola’s Bayern side. Ex-City defender Jerome Boateng was the scorer on a positive yet disappointing night for The Blues in Germany.
Many in the blue camp were confident going into the game with Bayern without several key players, including Franck Ribéry and Bastian Schweinsteiger. Nonetheless, it showed their strength in depth to be able to start what was still a very strong team despite missing a few key components.
In the other dugout, Manuel Pellegrini and Rubén Cousillas will have kept one eye on the Chelsea game at the weekend and as such started a team that was also weakened by injuries and suspensions. Jovetić and Fernando were both out, meaning we saw a return of the Yaya-Fernandinho midfield that worked so well last year, as well as Džeko starting as the lone striker upfront. Pablo Zabaleta was also missing due to his suspension carrying over from last season.
The first half started in relatively expected fashion: Bayern were given a good chance within 45 seconds, due to some good passing play that led to Thomas Müller putting his shot wide thanks to a good bit of pressure from new signing Bacary Sagna.
That wasn’t the first time Bayern came close in the first half. Müller forced good saves from Hart as did Lewandowski and Alaba and the England goalkeeper was required to be in good form to keep the hosts at bay.
In their own attacks, City looked threatening but mainly on the counter. Navas provided some much-needed pace down the right-hand side, with Silva and Džeko through the middle. However, Medhi Benatia looked solid in the centre of defence, and stopped City building up any real danger to the Bayern goal except on a couple of occasions. Bacary Sagna forced a good save from Manuel Neuer after winning a header at the front post, but that was the closest City came, and it was level 0-0 at the break.
After being held goalless for the first 45 minutes, Bayern came out fighting for the second half – again requiring Joe Hart to be on top form. He saved well from Alaba, Müller and the eventual gamewinner Boateng, as well as having good presence in the box and quick distribution; two factors he often lacks in his game. City looked to attack on the counter for much of the second period but failed to build any real chances. A few slip-ups in the Bayern half led to good set-piece opportunities, but these were wasted by the City players.
In the end the introduction of Arjen Robben, who had been a doubt for the game and only made the bench, on 75 minutes changed the game. He came on up against Gaël Clichy (and eventually Aleksandar Kolarov who was brought on in the dying minutes) and gave a new dynamic to the Bayern attack. He was skilful and dangerous, something the Bavarians had somewhat lacked. There were shouts that he dived in the box minutes after coming on but nothing came of it.
Then, in the 89th minute, Jerome Boateng broke City hearts. The ball fell to him from a ricochet on the left-hand side of the box. He controlled it with his first touch, and sent Hart sprawling to his left seconds later, as Boateng sent an outside-foot volley into the side of the net. It was helped along the way by a deflection from Mario Götze, but judging by the reaction of Boateng he will certainly try to claim it.
Not a good day by any means for City fans. The late winner is the obvious downside, but a lacklustre performance from Yaya Touré is another. However, considering the players who were missing and the fact that the manager had to watch the game from the stands, there has to be positives to take. Fernandinho was extremely impressive, holding the City midfield together while Yaya was underperforming, and Joe Hart kept City in the game for 89 minutes. He’s been heavily-criticised in recent months but showed today that the old Joe is still in there. Now, City look forward to the visit of Chelsea on Sunday, and the visit of AS Roma to The Etihad in their next Champions League game.
