2 hours ago
30
Manchester City drew 0-0 with Sunderland in the Premier League on New Year's Day and suffered a double injury blow but there was some good news for Pep Guardiola
Manchester City missed the chance to cut the gap to Arsenal at the top of the Premier League to two points as they were held to a 0-0 draw by Sunderland on New Year's Day.
The Blues were hit by injuries in the gruelling north east clash with Nico Gonzalez forced off at half time and Savinho replaced early in the second half. Rodri and Jeremy Doku made their returns to action from lay-offs of their own but the injury issues will be a concern to Pep Guardiola who is also without Oscar Bobb and Mateo Kovacic.
But the Blues were handed a boost at the Stadium of Light as the three players who were one game away from a suspension, and therefore at risk of missing out against Chelsea on Sunday, all avoided a yellow card.
Gonzalez may miss out regardless depending on the severity of his injury but captain Bernardo Silva came through the contest without a caution as did goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma. A booking for any of that trio would have been their fifth of the campaign and resulted in a one-game ban.
The deadline now extends to matchday 32 with the threshold increasing to 10 yellow cards. It means there will be no domestic suspensions for City stars anytime soon but should any player hit double figures for bookings, they will receive a two-game ban.
Despite seeing his side's eight game winning run ended, Guardiola was pleased with most of his side's performance. "A really good game, especially the second half. The first half was tight, we just missed to score a goal in the six yard box," he said. "We had many there, good actions against a fantastic team but I’m so proud and delighted at the way we played in a difficult stadium against difficult opponents. We did everything to win but in the end we could not win it.
"We created a lot. I don’t know if a team was able to come here and created what we created. They had an offside and Erling had one or two. They had some transitions because our shape was not correct, the second half Rodri helped us and when you are five, six, seven times in the six yard box and cannot do it, that was the only thing missing.
"But we played miles better than Nottingham Forest and today we could not win. Now it’s recovery because we have two days to the Chelsea game and we go for it."
English (US) ·