The chase continues. Never mind that this was hardly Manchester City at their best, a routine victory over Huddersfield moves Pep Guardiola’s team back to within four points of Liverpool at the top of the Premier League table. More to the point, another three strikes were added to their bold attempt to break every known goalscoring record.
For Huddersfield the consequence was very different. This was a defeat that leaves them ten points adrift of safety, in danger of a permanent crick in the neck with the effort of looking forever upwards. It was a dire defeat, ripe with evidence of the Premier League’s unbreachable quality gap, which provided a fitting full stop to a week which had begun miserably with the departure of David Wagner. It was somehow in keeping with unhappy circumstance that an intended message from the outgoing manager recorded to thank the fans failed to be broadcast before the game, after succumbing to a technical glitch.
For Mark Hudson, the man who stepped in to hold the fort after Wagner’s departure, there was to be no Ole Gunnar Solskjaer effect. With the Borussia Dortmund coach Jan Siewert set to be appointed later this week, this is likely to be Hudson’s sole match in charge.
But he will have had long enough, pacing the technical area throughout the game, to have seen at close hand the reasons why Wagner felt he could do no more. For all the wonders the German may have delivered in his three and a half years in Yorkshire, he has left Huddersfield with a squad so bereft of quality there is only one direction they are heading. Too many anonymous journeymen delivering too little meaningful application is no recipe for escape. The crowd’s ironic chorus of oles for every successful pass in the game’s dying moments a clear indication of a need to take pleasure where they can.
Not that City were at their scintillating best here. But then they didn’t need to be. For the first ten minutes they seemed oddly reticent, unable to find the right pass to unlock Huddersfield’s determined, if limited, defence. True, Raheem Sterling was furious he wasn’t awarded a penalty after Terence Kongolo brought him down after 12 minutes. And he had a point. Quite how Andre Marriner missed what was clearly a trip by the Huddersfield defender will remain one of the mysteries of the season.
Sterling didn’t have long to brood on injustice, however. Five minutes later, Danilo whipped a speculative cross shot into the Huddersfield box. For some reason Christopher Schindler decided to bow in front of it, as if in supplication, succeeding only in deflecting the ball off the top of his head beyond Jonas Lossl. It was City’s 100th goal of the season in all competitions. Perhaps more pertinently it was the 21st goal recorded since they last conceded.
But if it looked ominously as if the flood gates had just been hospitably held open for the City attack to inflict Burton-like damage on the Huddersfield goals against column, the visitors seemed unwilling to exploit their obvious superiority. Ilkay Gundogan, Leroy Sane, even the previously unimpeachable Kevin De Bruyne were wasteful in possession, pedestrian in their build up. For much of the opening exchanges there was a very uncharacteristic lack of precision about City’s efforts: crosses were too long, through balls rolled too far, passes went astray.
Not for the first time they could be grateful that Fernandinho did not succumb to the general malaise. Apparently operating in his own forcefield, untroubled, unhurried, everything he did was clean and neat. Even his fouls had a brusque efficiency. A classic on Elias Kachunga, steering him at pace into the City dug out, where he fell at Guardiola’s feet, earned the Brazilian a yellow card. Fernandinho apart, so lethargic were City, Guardiola was clearly obliged to read the riot act at half time.
“Yeah we adjust some things when we had the ball,” was the City manager’s euphemistic analysis. “Without the ball we didn’t suffer too much. We adjust to attack more fluently inside and outside.”
They did that all right. Within minutes of the restart Sterling suddenly came to life, scuttling across the Huddersfield area before working the ball back to De Bruyne. The Belgian fed Sane, who despite appearing to be offside, crossed. His ball found Sterling, confusing the home defence by materialising on the other side of the penalty area, to steer an impudent diving header past Lossl.
Moments later there was another example of City’s clinical core. Jason Puncheon, making his first Huddersfield appearance on loan from Crystal Palace, misplaced a pass which landed at the feet of Danilo. Before the home side could blink, he fired a long ball on to Sergio Aguero’s forehead. His deft layoff into Sane’s path was perfection. The German did not have to break stride as he ran on, feinted, left Lossl on his haunches and slipped the ball into the net.
For Huddersfield there was no way back, even when Fernandinho was removed to protect against another yellow card. Their hapless condition was summed up when, with the last shot of the game, the substitute Steve Mounie missed from a yard out. For them life after Wagner looks chastening indeed.