Enlarge image
Pep Guardiola: Record against Thomas Tuchel improved
Photo:
Javier Garcia / Shutterstock / imago images / Shutterstock
Manchester City won the top game in the Premier League at Chelsea FC.
The champions prevailed 1-0 (0-0) against the league leaders, Gabriel Jesus scored the goal (53rd minute), which meant that Chelsea slipped from first to third place;
City is now second behind Liverpool FC.
Manchester United lost 1-0 to Aston Villa at the same time, and star striker Cristiano Ronaldo failed to score for the first time since his return to Manchester.
The duel between Chelsea and City was the remake of the Champions League final last season. Then defeated the London team of coach Thomas Tuchel's Pep Guardiolas City 1-0, winning goal scorer: Kai Havertz. It was also the fourth meeting of the two coaches since Tuchel took over the London club earlier this year. For the first time, it wasn't Chelsea. Overall, the balance of the two star coaches is as follows: three wins Tuchel, five wins Guardiola, one draw.
Tuchel had come up with something special for this game.
He moved away from his usual 3-4-2-1 system and opted for an additional defensive midfielder - a move that shaped the game.
Because Manchester barely made it through the tight defense of the Blues, so Tuchel got the stability he should have been after.
Only: At the same time, the hosts were almost in no danger, because strikers Romelu Lukaku and Timo Werner were always faced with a larger city outnumber.
Hardly any degrees in half one
Long shots from Rodri (33rd) and De Bruyne (39th) on the one hand, a blocked shot from Werner on the other (18th), both teams couldn't manage more in half one, and these attempts were hardly a scoring chance they were too harmless for that.
But: That changed after the break.
First it was City's star entry Jack Grealish (came in the summer for 117.5 million euros), who missed the goal after 48 minutes with his flick.
Then after a corner the 1-0 fell.
A shot from João Cancelo landed at Gabriel Jesus, who took the lead with a deflected attempt from the spin.
Shortly thereafter, goalkeeper Édouard Mendy prevented the second goal for the guests against Grealish (58th), and the 2-0 was also close at the conclusion of Gabriel Jesus, as defender Thiago Silva blocked the 24-year-old's shot for the already beaten Chelsea -Keeper just before the goal line (61st).
Tuchel reacted to the deficit by replacing offensive player Havertz for the more defensive N'Golo Kanté, the Chelsea team, which had been geared towards stability until then, became noticeably more offensive.
But there were no clear opportunities.
Marcos Alonso got stuck with a free kick (65th), Mateo Kovačić didn't hit the goal, but the leg of defender Rúben Dias (71st).
The riskier way of playing the blues also led to space for City.
The result: Grealish ran freely towards Mendy, but failed because of the strong goalkeeper (83rd).
Aymeric Laporte had previously missed another great Manchester chance after a corner (79th).
The missed opportunities did not take revenge, however - the team with the better opportunities won the game.
Both clubs face the next challenges during the week.
Manchester travels to Paris Saint-Germain in the Champions League with Lionel Messi.
And Chelsea meet Juventus in Turin.
mon
