Three days after playing Dortmund, the team headed south to London to challenge Fulham away.
This is the fifth round of the Premier League this season.
Although Courtois's outstanding performance after the match against Dortmund won unanimous praise, Guardiola, Begiristain and others decided after study to still let Joe Hart play this game.
On the one hand, it is for rotation, and on the other hand, it is also to appease the players and fans.
In any case, Joe Hart is England's national goalkeeper. It is really unreasonable for him to lose his main position in a few games. Moreover, the emotions of local fans are also a key consideration for the team.
After communication and coordination, it was finally decided to let Joe Hart.
After playing the Champions League game against Dortmund, the team was very exhausted, so Guardiola decided to make a strong rotation in this game, even arranging Hazard, Dzeko and Aguero in the frontcourt.
The trident combination left Douglas Costa on the bench.
Also on the bench is Su Dong, who performed well against Dortmund and will be rotated this time.
At Craven Cottage, Manchester City still insisted on playing in a four-three-three formation.
The goalkeeper is Joe Hart, the defense is Leighton Baines, Javi Martinez, David Luiz and Zabaleta, the midfielder is Busquets, Moutinho and Toni
Kroos advanced forward, and the front trident was a combination of Hazard, Dzeko and Aguero.
Toni Kroos is very much used by Guardiola and has played many times in a row. This also shows that Guardiola relies heavily on the German midfielder, and Toni Kroos's performance is becoming more and more stable.
He has become an indispensable passer in the Manchester City team.
According to media statistics, Toni Kroos and Busquets are the players with the most passes and the highest success rate in the Premier League this season. Even in the five major leagues, they only lost to Barcelona's Xavi and Iniesta.
Almost the same as Messi.
…
Su Dong sat on the visiting team's bench, watching the game intently and analyzing the situation between the enemy and ourselves.
Manchester City pressed forward aggressively from the beginning, suppressing Fulham. They relied on their skillful passing and controlling of the ball to firmly lock the initiative in the game, and frequently created threats, creating several consecutive breakthroughs into the penalty area.
Shot opportunity.
It took the home team Fulham until the fifteenth minute for Dempsey to complete the first shot, a long shot from the left side of the penalty area.
Joe Hart performed very steadily this time and caught the ball firmly.
Just two minutes later, Toni Kroos sent a through ball from the front of the penalty area. Moutinho pushed it to the right near the penalty spot. Aguero ran out of space, received the ball and formed a single shot, and easily succeeded in pushing and shooting for Manchester City.
Opening the record.
One to zero!
Su Dong, along with all the bench players, stood up from their seats and applauded Aguero's goal.
Since joining Manchester City, Aguero has scored a lot of goals, and his scoring efficiency is even higher than when he was at Atletico Madrid, and he has shown stronger strength, which has won him more and more recognition.
His old father-in-law, football champion Maradona, said that Aguero received more support in Manchester City, but he had to succumb to Su Dong. The implication was somewhat playful, and he probably felt that his
The son-in-law is no worse than Su Dong.
For this matter, Aguero even explained a few words to Su Dong in private, but Su Dong didn't take it to heart.
Su Dong still admires Aguero very much.
Who told them both to have a best friend in common?
…
After the goal, Fulham tried to counterattack.
Martin Jol is a Dutch referee, and he is more offensive-minded at heart.
But Manchester City soon made a quick counterattack. After Hazard got the ball on the left, he forced a breakthrough, attracting the attention of two defensive players, and then passed it to Leighton Baines who came in behind.
A long shot with his foot, slightly higher than the goal.
No goal was scored, but the knock on the wall still made Fulham break out in a cold sweat.
Manchester City continued to stabilize the situation, adopted high-pressure tactics against Fulham, frequently applied pressure and created threats.
Fulham was under heavy pressure, although they were quite embarrassed, but they were also patiently waiting for opportunities to launch a counterattack, but they could only threaten Manchester City's goal through long-range shots.
Joe Hart's performance tonight was relatively stable, he did not give his opponents a chance and made no mistakes.
In the first half, Manchester City finally took the lead 1-0.
After the halftime break, the second half changed sides. In just ten minutes, the kickoff in the frontcourt was passed back to the backcourt. Javi Martinez moved to the left. Leighton Bynes made a long pass.
Coe's header passed to Aguero. After the Argentine removed the ball, he rushed to the outside of the penalty area and suddenly took a cold shot.
The shot was shot fast and urgently. Although goalkeeper Schwarzer made a save, he was unable to stop it and the ball went into the net.
Two to zero!
…
After scoring two goals in a row, everyone basically believed that Manchester City's situation was decided.
Even Guardiola was signaling that the players on the field should be a little more stable. On the contrary, Fulham, when trailing by two goals, was more relaxed, frequently instigated counterattacks, and was more determined in counterattacks.
This is basically in line with the characteristics of the Premier League team.
You can lose in away games, but at home, especially in front of the home fans, you must show your aggressiveness and desire to win no matter what. Otherwise, how can you convince the home fans to continue to buy tickets and support?
Under Fulham's increasing counterattack, Manchester City lost the goal in the 55th minute.
After stealing the ball in the backcourt, two players, Dembele and Dempsey, passed the ball in succession, tearing apart Manchester City's defense. Zamora blocked Javi Martinez with his body in the penalty area, turned around and kicked off forcefully.
Hit the goal and scored a goal for Fulham.
One to two!
This goal can be said to have boosted Fulham's morale.
Just two minutes later, there was another long pass from the center circle. Dempsey entered the penalty area at high speed and planned to hit the goal directly.
This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading the exciting content! At the critical moment, Zabaleta, who was wearing the captain's armband on the field, returned to the defense in time and blocked Dempsey's shot, resolving a crisis.
But then Fulham played more vigorously and frequently launched counterattacks. The players were also affected and became more active. This caused Manchester City to make mistakes in passing and controlling the ball, while Fulham launched counterattacks again and again.
Guardiola made a decisive substitution and replaced Moutinho with Gareth Barry. Obviously, he also wanted to strengthen the defensive strength of the midfield and contain Fulham's counterattack as soon as possible.
But in the 68th minute, unexpectedly, after a pass from Sidwell, Murphy shot directly from the outside of the penalty area. When the ball flew into the penalty area, it hit David Luiz's leg and redirected into the penalty area.
Manchester City's goal.
Joe Hart was stunned at the goal line.
Damn it, even this is possible?
The referee immediately blew the whistle, indicating that the goal was valid, but it was not an own goal, but a long-range shot by Murphy.
Now Manchester City is in an embarrassing situation.
Joe Hart was so depressed that he almost wanted to tear down the goal in front of him.
His performance tonight was not bad, it could even be said to be pretty good, but in the end he was still scored, two goals in one goal.
Damn it, can you please stop bullying people like this?
Now is the critical moment when he competes with Courtois for the main goalkeeper, and he is actually playing this kind of game at this time?
It’s almost like even God is kidding him!
…
Su Dong watched from the sidelines as his team led from 2-0 and was chased by Fulham by two goals.
You can't really blame Joe Hart for these two goals.
The problem with the first goal is that Javi Martinez is not a central defender. When a midfielder is defending, he thinks about things from a different angle than a central defender because there is a defender behind him.
But the central defender is different. If the opponent turns around and directly kicks the goal, it is very fatal.
Javi Martinez's defensive habits caused the first goal to be conceded. This is actually to blame. Guardiola can only be blamed. Why should Javi Martinez be played as a central defender?
As for the second goal conceded, it was purely a matter of luck.
Football games are like that sometimes.
Just like Murphy's long shot, if David Luiz didn't block it and didn't touch it, he might not be able to score. But it was David Luiz's touch that caused the ball to change direction.
So the ball went in.
Su Dong saw that Guardiola was obviously very depressed and shook his head angrily on the sidelines. He was obviously very dissatisfied with the result.
It would be the same for anyone else. From two to zero to two to two, who can accept it?
I'm afraid the happiest people are the tens of thousands of fans present and the people from Fulham.
In fact, they played more vigorously, as if they were going to reverse Manchester City on the spot.
Especially in the 74th minute, Murphy stepped in again. After taking a feint shot from the outside of the penalty area, he suddenly passed the ball directly into the penalty area and assisted Riise to kick the goal in the penalty area, but it was slightly higher.
Fulham is really playing more and more vigorously, while Manchester City seems a little panicked.
Guardiola finally lost his temper and immediately made substitutions.
…
"Sue, we need you!"
Guardiola came to the bench with a stern look on his face and shouted to Su Dong.
The noise at the scene was too loud. If he didn't shout louder, he was afraid that Su Dong wouldn't be able to hear him.
Su Dong stood up from the bench, nodded and said: "Don't worry, it's okay."
After finishing speaking, Su Dong ran out to warm up for a short while and then ran back to the coaching bench.
At this time, Fulham head coach Martin Jol had noticed the movements on Manchester City's side, especially when he saw Sudong warming up. He immediately nervously reminded his players to pay attention, especially Hangeland.
But he still seemed a little worried and immediately looked at the bench.
At this moment, Swiss central defender Felipe Senderos, who was loaned from Arsenal this summer, was sitting on the bench. He noticed the coach's eyes looking over and his heart trembled for no reason.
Especially when he felt Martin Joel's hot eyes, he couldn't help but look elsewhere.
When Martin Joel saw it, he immediately let out a helpless sigh in his heart.
How could such a good central defender back then be so abused by Su Dong that he was left with a psychological shadow?
