Manchester City vs Ipswich Review
Manchester City, who are leading the league, extended their remarkable unbeaten streak in the Premier League against newly-promoted teams to an impressive 32 games with a 3-2 victory over Ipswich Town. In their first home league match since being found guilty of over 100 financial violations, the Premier League anthem was met with boos from the crowd. Although the atmosphere off the pitch was intense, the game itself started slowly for City as they struggled to gain early momentum.
However, once they found their rhythm, it seemed inevitable that they would take the lead. Ruben Dias took a powerful shot that forced Ipswich’s goalkeeper Christian Walton into a spectacular save, but the visitors failed to respond, and shortly after, City went ahead when Jeremy Doku’s cross was converted by Phil Foden, a player who had been somewhat overlooked. However, that didn’t stop Gary O’Neil’s team, who responded immediately when Abdoul Ouattara’s precise pass behind Marc Guehi released Daizen Maeda, who calmly scored an equalizer.
The visitors didn’t stay level for long because, after missing a chance to take the lead when Emersonn’s shot narrowly missed, they were undone by the inevitable, Erling Haaland appeared in the center of the box to head in Mateo Kovacic’s cross. Dias had the opportunity to put Enzo Maresca’s team in a strong position before halftime, but his second powerful shot of the afternoon was met with an equally impressive save from Walton. After the break, headed attempts from Emersonn and Nico O’Reilly went wide, prolonging the wait for the game’s fourth goal. This was likely more concerning for Ipswich, who knew scoring chances would be scarce.
Fernandez missed another opportunity to extend City’s lead when he sent a 25-yard free kick high over the bar, but that was the last chance the Tractor Boys had. Haaland then broke through the visitors’ defense and calmly finished to score City’s third goal, effectively ending the contest. O’Neil’s team faced a tough challenge to recover from that position, despite having scored many late goals this season. They did manage to grab a late consolation goal through Zian Flemming’s penalty. Meanwhile, the City machine keeps moving forward, even though VAR prevented Haaland from completing a hat-trick during the final moments of their seventh consecutive win to begin the season.
