Manchester City 4 Borussia Moenchengladbach 0
Sergio Agüero scored his second hat-trick in two Champions League starts as Manchester City prolonged their 100% to the season with a comfortable victory in their rain-delayed Champions League game, making it seven wins out of seven in all competitions.
The only surprise of an impressive display against outclassed opponents was it took Agüero so long to register his third goal after putting his side two up inside half an hour. He had a number of chances but looked like being thwarted until Raheem Sterling finally played him into miles of space with an imaginative pass. Agüero only just managed to stay onside, though after that rounding Yann Sommer was a formality. The Argentine had already left the field to a standing ovation by the time Leroy Sané conjured a fourth goal for fellow substitute Kelechi Iheanacho, for a scoreline that amounted to a fair reflection of City’s overall superiority.
As a result of the previous night’s postponement Ilkay Gündogan made his first start for City following his £21m move from Dortmund, replacing David Silva who was in the original line-up but had not felt well on the morning of the game. Returning was Agüero, serving a domestic suspension at the moment, and the striker took just nine minutes to take his tally for the season to seven. Sterling did well first to pressurise the German defence on the left, then to hold possession until Aleksandar Kolarov arrived, the full-back whipping in an unanswerable low cross that only needed a touch of Agüero’s boot to divert the ball into the roof of the net. Gündogan himself was almost on the scoresheet next, bringing a full-stretch save from Sommer after Kevin De Bruyne had escaped down the right and attempted to find Agüero in the area. The striker could only help the ball on to Gündogan, whose first time shot was on target, though possibly too close to the centre of goal to make life hard for the goalkeeper. Mönchengladbach are perfectly aware of Gündogan’s strengths, of course, just as they are familiar with De Bruyne. Their problem lay in denying space to them both, and when De Bruyne drifted wide to allow Gündogan to advance through the middle, the latter played in Sterling for a shot that Tobias Strobl had to clear off the line.
The visitors were just showing signs of life in attack midway through the first half when City went further ahead. Nicolás Otamendi brought the ball forward, something he is clearly being encouraged to do by Pep Guardiola, and De Bruyne found Gündogan in the area via a deflection off Oscar Wendt only for Christoph Kramer to trip the City player from behind before the pass arrived. It might have been accidental but it was an obvious penalty, and Agüero scored confidently from the spot. The striker could have had his hat-trick by the interval, though he put a shot too high from the edge of the area in the last minute of the half following remarkable persistence from Sterling, who seemed to have lost the ball on a couple of occasions but managed to hold on despite falling over to create a chance for Agüero.
Gündogan also brought a save from Sommer towards the end of the first half, while Claudio Bravo at the other end was a virtual spectator until Lars Stindl tested him three minutes from the break with a shot from a corner. The goalkeeper got down to his left well to beat the ball away, though in view of his erratic performance in the derby at Old Trafford at the weekend it was perhaps surprising Mönchengladbach did not make him work a little harder. Bravo must have been relieved to see the first 45 minutes go by without having to deal with any crosses under pressure.
Agüero limped off with what appeared to be a twisted knee at the interval but reappeared for the second half, which began in exactly the same way as the first with De Bruyne finding acres of space in which to pick out team-mates further forward. Agüero’s hat-trick should have arrived in the 50th minute, courtesy of a Sterling pass following a goalkeeping fumble, yet just when it appeared the Argentine had the goal at his mercy Sommer recovered to get a hand to a shot bound for the top corner.
City were playing some relaxed, adventurous football, moving the ball to and fro across the pitch with only Jesús Navas’s habitual inability to deliver a decisive final ball interrupting their flow. Sterling too lost the ball on occasions, though he beat his man in several instances too and appears to have rediscovered the zest and willingness to take risks that seemed to desert him last season. John Stones was assuredness personified at the back, not that the Germans put the City backline under any great pressure, ably accompanied by Otamendi who seems a more confident, buccaneering type of defender this season.
De Bruyne was running the show though, with Gündogan gradually fading in his first competitive game for months. If Guardiola can find a way of playing De Bruyne, Gündogan and Silva in the same team City will be almost impossible to stop and there will be no need to mourn the demise of Yaya Touré. Not that everything is perfect. Sterling should have scored City’s third goal from De Bruyne’s invitation long before Agüero completed his hat-trick instead of hesitating with only Sommer to beat and allowing the goalkeeper to make a save, though at least he redeemed himself by playing in Agüero for a similar one on one 10 minutes from time. City’s leading scorer was never likely to miss that sort of opportunity, and nor did he.
(Guardian service)
