Aston Villa and Nicolas Jackson punish Man City with more costly Guehi and Donnarumma mistakes
When he sits down to analyse where it all went wrong, Enzo Maresca will lament the number of mistakes his Manchester City side made.
For a team that going into this game had a 100% winning start to the Premier League, even against the backdrop of a guilty verdict, they looked far from an all-conquering outfit against an Aston Villa side that was more clinical and better in key areas.
Villa started excellently. Made to play against their favoured Holte End in the first half, they were much sharper than their opponents and started far stronger than the lunchtime kickoff usually dictates.
Within six minutes, they were ahead. The latest in a growing list of mistakes by Marc Guehi, who has been poor since the final third of last season, gave them the opener. A lobbed pass was first controlled by his foot, only to bounce up and hit his knee in the kind of thing that happens in Sunday league rather than the Premier League.
The loose ball fell to John McGinn, who immediately played Jackson in. Left entirely free, he hit the shot with plenty of power but Donnarumma failed to stop it at his near post.
Guehi was booked later on and hooked at half-time.
City did weather that early storm and if they were to come back, it always felt as if one of the wingers would cause it.
Jeremy Doku provided a couple of brilliant runs into the box where the ball seems stuck to his feet, while Iliman Ndiaye curled a shot with his supposedly weaker left foot but Zion Suzuki was equal to it.
In the end, it was Ndiaye who did find City’s way back into the game. A free kick was played short to him on the wing and he produced the kind of lofted ball that Erling Haaland feeds upon.
Villa have been typically good at keeping Haaland quiet but all six foot five of the Norwegian rose to get above the defence and meet Ndiaye’s cross. His header was perfect, into the floor and into the corner to give Suzuki no chance.
A typical City win would have seen Haaland score another before they kept the ball for the rest of the game, but their defensive frailties were again on show as Donnarumma failed to stop Jackson’s second.
If there was a degree of understanding in conceding the first, Donnarumma will not be afforded such sympathy for the second. Brahim Mbaye picked out Jackson unmarked in the area but his shot was straight at the City keeper.
Instead of getting his body behind it, Donnarumma collapsed on it, allowing it to roll under him and give Villa the lead once again.
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That mistake was reflective of a City side that were largely poor save a few of their expensive superstars.
Enzo Fernandez was arguably the worst offender amongst them. Two successive £100+m moves make you believe that he must be good and yet watching him for any extended period makes you doubt that.
He had the most touches and yet did very little with any of them. He tried to buy a penalty with a ridiculous dive and spent as much time with his hands in the air complaining as he did creating chances.
The passenger alongside him meant that Elliot Anderson had to be at his best to stop City being completely overrun by Villa’s much more dynamic midfield.
The pattern of the game was set after Villa’s second. City had plenty of the ball but were wasteful in any half-chances they did draw out of Villa’s well-organised defence.
And while City brought on 18-year-old to try and change their fortunes, Villa were able to bring on a former Bayern Munich midfielder and their young talent Brian Madjo.
City neither huffed nor puffed as the minutes ticked down at a windy Villa Park with more camera shots of flags fluttering than goals scored by City.
It opens the door to Arsenal, who could move top with a particularly large thumping of Everton, but City’s position on top of the Premier League table did come with the caveat that they had not really played many good teams yet. Liverpool away was the only real challenge in a fixture list that has seen them already face two of the promoted teams.
Villa meanwhile are a team that overcame their slow start to be unbeaten in their last seven matches.
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