Wolves stun Man City with Traore double
MANCHESTER: Two late goals from Wolves’ Adama Traore inflicted a stunning 2-0 defeat on Manchester City to leave the Premier League champions trailing leaders Liverpool by eight points.
It was a thoroughly deserved victory for Nuno Espirito Santo’s men, who enjoyed the better chances and became the first team to stop City scoring at the Etihad Stadium for 34 matches.
Even with only eight games played, Liverpool now have a golden chance to win their first league title for 30 years after starting the campaign with eight straight wins. And as time ticked on, the urgency of the situation for Pep Guardiola’s side was apparent as they have already dropped more points at home than in the whole of last season.
“It was not our best day. We let them run twice, got nervous a little bit and our process to create chances was not good,” Guardiola said. “We were not organised and lost balls in positions we could not lose them in. We had problems on the counter-attack in the end and it was a bad day.”
City were again made to pay for a series of key defensive injuries and badly missed the creativity of Kevin De Bruyne in midfield.
Wolves had two days less rest and a trip back from Istanbul to cope with after winning at Besiktas in Europa League on Thursday. However they never tired and took their chances through Traore in the final 10 minutes. City looked like the team suffering a European hangover as they struggled to move with their usual fluidity and Wolves goalkeeper Rui Patricio was not called into action until past the half-hour mark when he pushed away Raheem Sterling’s shot.
With 10 minutes remaining, the decisive blow was delivered by Traore as he coolly slotted past Ederson after Jimenez had skipped away from Nicolas Otamendi for his first goal since August 2018. And in the final minute of injury time with City pushing men forward, Traore repeated the trick when he was put clear with an almost identical goal as he beat Ederson again.
CHELSEA TRIUMPH
SOUTHAMPTON: Chelsea closed in on the Premier League’s top four as striker Tammy Abraham scored his eighth league goal of the season to help them secure a 4-1 win at struggling Southampton on Sunday on the back of an excellent first-half performance.
Mason Mount, N’Golo Kante and Michy Batshuayi were also on target as Chelsea moved into fifth place on 14 points from eight games, behind fourth-placed Leicester on goal difference. Southampton stayed 16th on seven points, one point above the relegation zone.
Abraham, the league’s joint top scorer alongside Manchester City striker Sergio Aguero, fired Chelsea ahead in the 17th minute as he latched on to a clever pass from Callum Hudson-Odoi and looped his shot over advancing keeper Angus Gunn.
ARSENAL WIN
David Luiz scored his first goal for Arsenal in a 1-0 win over Bournemouth on Sunday which lifted Unai Emery’s side up to third in the Premier League.
Luiz headed home off a corner from Nicolas Pepe with nine minutes gone. It turned out to be the only goal of a game that lacked both chances and quality as the Cherries managed to keep in-form Arsenal striker PierreEmerick Aubameyang on the periphery. Arsenal have still lost just once this season in the league and now sit one point behind defending champions Manchester City.
UNITED LOSE
Newcastle teenager Matthew Longstaff added to Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s problems as he marked his Premier League debut with the superb strike that sealed a shock 1-0 win over woeful Manchester United on Sunday.
Solskjaer’s side paid the price for their latest lethargic display as Longstaff bagged his first goal for Newcastle in the second half at St James’ Park.