City remain top but that might not be the case in a couple of hours. Stoke clamber to eighth, for now, and it is not unreasonable on this evidence to suggest they can be there in May. Keep Xherdan Shaqiri happy and fit and Mark Hughes’s team will certainly carry massive threat.
Thanks for reading, and for your emails and tweets. Now go and keep an eye on all the afternoon’s goals with Niall McVeigh. Bye!
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Full-time: Stoke 2-0 Man City
Martin Atkinson puts the league leaders out of their misery and a little fracas between the match-winner Arnautovic and Delph is quickly ended by Joe Hart and several other team-mates. City were poor, giving the ball away, defending at sixes and sevens, but Stoke have been brilliant today. They blew the visitors away with quick counterattacking and incisive passing, twice Shaqiri the creator and Arnautovic the finisher. The Premier League is a funny thing this year.
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90+1 mins: City are walking out with their hands up.
“All kinds of unexpected, uncomfortable but intriguing feelings watching stoke,” Rob Lowery head-scratches. “How can admiration that seems so right be wrong? Separate note: Raheem Sterlings running action will look seriously out of place in 5 or 10 years time unless he adjusts it. ‘Juvenile’ is most polite adjective......all hanging hands and dancing knees...”
89 mins: BT Sport have given Arnautovic man of the match. His movement and finishing has obviously been excellent, but Shaqiri was on another level to anyone on the pitch, so it’s a bit baffling.
87 mins: If a single City player comes out and mentions the wind they will be pilloried but there’s no doubt that it has been some sort of factor in the game, a factor that Stoke have dealt with an awful lot better. Stoke fans are giving it the olés now.
84 mins: Jonathan Walters comes on for Afellay. Walters must be looking at this performance and wondering where his next start is coming from.
“I’m not sure if Rafa Benitez would agree with JP Murphy,” points out Nicholas Roscow.
82 mins: Kevin De Bruyne pumps in another windy corner. City have had a lot of corners and I can’t remember a single one amounting to anything worth reporting.
Simon Ward emails: “After last week’s result, does this mean that Big Sam is the best manager in the Premiership?”
79 mins: With ten minutes to go this game already feels like it is petering out. City don’t seem to have much left in the tank.
“Is there any angle from which Kolarov will not shoot?” Ponders J.R. “That last attempt was cuckoo. He often looks silly doing that, except of course when he scores when doing that.” He does attempt a lot of them, though I feel like he is the one person you would want to take a left-footed pot-shot from a nothing angle if everything depended on it.
77 mins: The Britannia rises as one again as Xherdan Shaqiri makes way for Marco van Ginkel. He has been sensational today, full of creativity and bright ideas admittedly against a slack City defence.
76 mins: Kolarov pounces on a loose ball in the box and smashes a shot with his left high into the side-netting.
JP Murphy emails: “So, another football manager discovers that picking your most skilful players tends to work well...”
74 mins: Fernando suddenly pulls up holding his hamstring and wanders off the pitch for a sit down on the bench. The physio comes over and takes him back down the tunnel, and City will play the rest of the match with 10 men having used all their subs.
72 mins: Bojan departs to a standing ovation, and is replaced by the Spanish striker Joselu.
70 mins: Not for the first time in this match Stoke should have finished City off. This was lovely to watch, Stoke’s three chief raiders combining as Bojan back-heeled for Arnautovic running into the penalty area. He squared a pass for Shaqiri (it might have been a miscued shot) who should have tapped into the net but couldn’t get a meaningful touch. A moment later Shaqiri threads another fine pass for Bojan who can’t quite beat Joe Hart in a race to the ball.
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67 mins: This is a really drab and dreary effort from City. There’s no sense that they are going to find a response anytime soon.
65 mins: The game is in stasis as City cautiously probe Stoke’s deep defensive banks. Fabian Delph gets his first sniff off the ball which he promptly pummels into the stands high above Jack Butland’s goal.
63 mins: Shaqiri shuffles neatly away from two defenders into space and fires a long-range shot down Joe Hart’s throat. For all his excellence, Shaqiri is still looking for his first Stoke goal.
61 mins: This game has become a bit terrible in the second half. The extremely windy conditions are not helping. David Silva, who has made a pretty muted return to action, is replaced by Jesus Navas and that is all three of Manuel Pellegrini’s subs used up.
59 mins: Howard Webb chips in on BT Sport with some insight, generally agreeing with Martin Atkinson’s decisions. Not everyone’s cup of tea but I like his input.
“Man City’s bench is frightening,” Niall Mullen emails. “For their fans.” The 17-year-old Cameron Humphreys is their centre-back sub today.
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56 mins: Some corner laughs ensue as the wind prevents De Bruyne from placing a stationary ball and he ends up crossing as it rolls towards him. The set piece comes to nothing. Pellegrini is not amused and makes a double change: Fernandinho and Bony come off, Delph and Iheanacho come on.
54 mins: Another Stoke attack is launched when City give away the ball. Bojan dribbles right at the heart of the defence and sidesteps the lunging Demichelis with ease, but Joe Hart saves his low shot when the forward should have put the game to bed.
52 mins: Shaqiri is at it again, jinking this way and that with Otamendi on his heels. The Argentinian decides enough is enough, does away with his cultured centre-back tag and gives Shaqiri a kicking. Yellow card.
50 mins: It’s difficult to know exactly how City can change in this second half. Pretty much every time they went forward in the first they ended up being attacked themselves but not coming forward isn’t much of tactic when you’re 2-0 down. A half-hearted City appeal for a handball in the Stoke box is turned down by Martin Atkinson.
48 mins: Yet another Stoke player is down after receiving a Man City clattering. The latest is Glenn Whelan who took a huge whack from Bony’s backside as the Ivorian leapt for a header. Whelan’s head snapped back further than Klitschko’s ever did the other night, but after a bit of treatment he looks OK to carry on.
Kick-off
Peeeeep! And Stoke get the second period going. No changes from the City bench at half-time.
The second half is coming up shortly. If you’ve just joined, yes, it’s 2-0 to Stoke. The Premier League is weird.
@LawrenceOstlere Have I missed something? When did Stoke get good?
— malsimon (@opheliasbrother) December 5, 2015
Half-time correspondence
“What a joy to watch Stoke are today!” trumpets George Trevers. “Shaqiri has put in the best performance of any player I’ve seen this season.”
I think Sergio Agüero might have something to say about that, but then I suppose you might not have seen that game so I’ll let it drop. Shaqiri has been brilliant, which makes you wonder a) how did a mid-table Premier League side sign him ahead of all the other clubs around Europe? And b) does he genuinely want to stay for the duration of his five-year contract through Peak Xherdan (he’s 24) or is he just using Stoke as a spring board? I imagine Stoke don’t mind being used, if this is the result.
“Ola Lawrence,” writes Spain’s Kevin Healey. “Nice MBM. A thought…Since Stoke are also ‘City’ it’d be most helpful if you would refer to the inferior Mancs version using the correct spelling – ‘Citeh’.”
Apologies.
Half-time: Stoke 2-0 Man City
That was a masterclass in counterattack football, Stoke lulling City forward, then pinching the ball and streaming forward in streaks of red and white to punish the league leaders. They’ve done exactly that, twice, and Shaqiri-Arnautovic Mark III was only prevented by what looked like a combination of Joe Hart’s chest and his left-hand post. A remarkable performance by a team who lost 2-0 to Sunderland last weekend.
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45 mins: On replay, it looked as if Hart made a brilliant save with his chest. A dramatic end to a dramatic half finally gets Pellegrini off his seat. As he does so, the wind blows the bouncing ball across the box and into a City player, but Martin Atkinson isn’t interested in penalty appeals for handball.
On Fernando’s iffy showing, Steve Cowan emails: “’Don’t you hear the guns Fernando’. Could put it into a song...”
43 mins: City have control and are pushing for a goal before half-time, which will probably result in a Stoke counterattack and goal... and as I write they pinch the ball, Shaqiri feeds Arnautovic and he’s in on goal for his hat-trick, but he slips as he shoots and hits the top of the post!
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41 mins: City’s best chance of the half, virtually their only clear sight of goal, comes through Kolarov who overlaps Silva down the left before firing a low shot on the angle which Butland saves with his feet.
39 mins: Afellay is down injured now after taking a few studs on the ankle from Fernando. Stoke fans aren’t used to all this writhing around on the floor but this is the inevitable result when you buy lots of fancy dans.
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37 mins: This is a game of temptation where Stoke sit and invite City to come forward, and every time the league leaders take up the offer they are rumbled off the ball and are being attacked themselves seconds later. It happens again, this time ending in a dangerous cross for Arnautovic who guides his header a fraction wide.
33 mins: Pieters takes an aerial clattering from Bony and is down receiving some treatment.
31 mins: Bojan jinks down the left and wins a corner, but it comes to nothing.
“Isn’t Fernando something of a liability?” ponders Sam Evans. “Both goals from diving in and gives the ball away when under little pressure. Surely Delph is a better option?” On this evidence it is hard to argue with that.
28 mins: As Joe Hart lines up a free-kick he gets a Britannia verse of “England’s number two!”
26 mins: Pretty much everything of interest so far in this match has come through Shaqiri. Now he throws his arms in the air, fed up as Fernandino and Fernando decide they’ve had enough of his trickery and crash through him to get to the ball. He might have woken the beast.
23 mins: Sagna whips a deep, inviting cross for Sterling to attack but the winger is just a little under it and can’t hit the target. Stoke break again and Shaqiri doesn’t seem bothered by his hamstring anymore, popping a lovely if totally unnecessary back-flick down the line before Sagna covers back to clear City’s lines.
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20 mins: A moment before that second goal Jack Butland had made a decent save from De Bruyne who might have done better than hit straight at the goalkeeper. Since the goal Shaqiri has been holding his hamstring a little – he’s on fire and Mark Hughes will certainly not want to bring the Swiss off if he can help it.
“The moves for both of those goals started with Fernando diving in and missing,” emails an unimpressed Paul Ruffley. “He’s not the best...”
17 mins: That might have been even better than the opener. Stoke broke with a quick pass into Shaqiri’s feet 40 yards out. He spun his man with a delicious Cruyff-turn before threading a pass perfectly into Marko Arnautovic’s run through the centre, so perfect that all the winger had to add was the flick of his boot to send the ball past the advancing Hart into the net.
GOAL! Stoke 2-0 Man City (Arnautovic, 15 min)
Shaqiri, Arnautovic, and the ball is in Joe Hart’s net again.
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13 mins: City come forward via Sagna down the right but Pieters clatters fairly through ball and man to clear. Looking back at the goal, Shaqiri’s skill was brilliant, making Kolarov look distinctly average with a wonderful step-over before bending a perfect cross into the passageway of doubt.
Michael Hood emails: “It looks as though Man City are not used to Stoke’s exotic climate!” Can you do it on a blustery Saturday, and so on and so forth.
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10 mins: City have reacted well since what was a pretty shabbily conceded goal, and Stoke are pinned back in two tight banks. Silva tries to find Bony but there’s no space for the striker to control the ball and Shawcross squeezes him out.
GOAL! Stoke 1-0 Man City (Arnautovic, 7 min)
Hughes’s full-skills ploy has paid off immediately! Shaqiri picks up the ball on the right and someone flicks his on switch – he suddenly bursts into action, wriggling away from Fernando and leaving him on his backside before crossing low for Arnautovic to bury from six yards.
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5 mins: It’s very blustery at the Britannia, which seems to have put Jack Butland’s radar a little skew-whiff and he clears the ball straight off the park. He could do with another good showing today with England’s current No1 up the other end.
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3 mins: City quickly get control of the ball, specifically through David Silva’s left foot. He tries to thread a ball through to Kevin De Bruyne making a run in off the right touchline but Pieters does well to cut it out.
Kick-off
Peeeeeeep! Martin Atkinson gets things under way, City in dark blue and Stoke in their usual red and white stripes.
Players line-up and listen to the Premier League theme tune, which I think is an attempt to copy the brilliance of the Champions League music, a flawed plan from the start. Then it’s hand shaking, that enthusiastic sprint into positions, and they’re just about ready at the Britannia.
Mark Hughes says of his bold attacking selection: “We struggle for goals and I just think there is an opportunity to try something different.”
“Going through the gears!” say City. Yes, but quite low gears (that sort of warm-up with mates before 5-aside just to say you’ve done it):
Going through the gears at the Britannia! Kick-off just over 15 minutes away! #stokevcity #mcfc pic.twitter.com/x4HkXBCQsy
— Manchester City FC (@MCFC) December 5, 2015
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There’s some talent in blue too, mind. David Silva and Joe Hart return to City’s line-up after injuries, although that boost is off-set by knocks to Sergio Agüero and Yaya Touré this week who miss out. Wilfried Bony will lead the line, and Fernando is chosen ahead of Fabian Delph to anchor midfield alongside Fernandinho.
Mark Hughes’s former squeeze comes round for dinner and he pulls out all the stops, chivalrous chap that he is. Wine, candles, that posh cutlery that’s never been used. Home-cooked shrimp tortellini. Man City are at the Britannia so out goes Jonathan Walters and in comes Ibrahim Afellay alongside Xherdan Shaqiri and Marko Arnautovic in midfield, that tantalising trio scheming behind Bojan in attack. Woof. Hughes has gone full skills.
Line-ups
Stoke City: Butland; Johnson, Shawcross, Wollscheid, Pieters; Cameron, Whelan; Shaqiri, Afellay, Arnautovic; Bojan
Subs: Haugaard, Joselu, Wilson, Van Ginkel, Adam, Diouf, Walters
Manchester City: Hart; Sagna, Otamendi, Demichelis, Kolarov; Fernando, Fernandinho; De Bruyne, Silva, Sterling; Bony
Subs: Caballero, Navas, Kelechi, Delph, Garcia, Clichy, Humphreys
Referee: Martin Atkinson
Preamble
At the end of May 2002, both clubs were feeling the warm glow of promotion. Manchester City were going up! We are going up! after topping Division One with 99 points and Stoke were going up! We are going up! after beating Brentford 2-0 in the Division Two play-off final.
More than 13 years on, they have taken wildly different routes to becoming Premier League mainstays, Man City spending big to become permanent residents in the top four and Stoke via Tony Pulis and now Mark Hughes pitching a spot in mid-table, having finished between 9th and 14th in all seven of their Premier League campaigns. Now both can be cautiously optimistic of taking their next step – for City, making a serious impact on the Champions League, for Stoke a top eight finish. And in going about achieving their goals they share something else in common: a fresh injection of entertaining panache.
Raheem Sterling and particularly Kevin De Bruyne have reignited City’s attack which this afternoon is likely to be bolstered by the return of David Silva (Sergio Agüero is injured, as is Yaya Touré). After all of Leicester’s wins and Vardy’s goals, West Ham beating the best away and Chelsea losing to the rest just about anywhere, could Man City be on the verge of establishing some semblance of normality to Premier League life? Bar a trip to the Emirates in a couple of weeks, City do not face another one of last year’s top six until mid-February. Given the relative levels of floundering from their expected title rivals it is not inconceivable that this vibrant, goals-from-all-angles City stay at the summit until May.
Then again, City’s heavy defeat at the hands of Jürgen Klopp’s ball-haranguers is still fresh in the mind and they face another challenge today in Stoke, who have reequipped with their own firepower. After a stuttering start Stoke have found some form with only two defeats in their last 12 games. Mark Hughes has Ibrahim Afellay back in the fold, while Xherdan Shaqiri has settled, Bojan is back near his best and Marko Arnautovic – perhaps with a kick up the jacksie from the added quality of those around him – is starting to realise his potential.
On the one hand Hughes’s squad is a oddly comic clash of Pulis relics and new shiny talent, a sturdy tree finally taken home and tinsled. But that base of English and Irish grit mixed with added splatter of Guardiola cast-offs may be bearing fruit, and ambitions of breaking into the top eight should not be written off just yet. Any result today against his former club would be a welcome bonus for Hughes in achieving Stoke’s next ambition.
Kick-off: 12.45pm GMT
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