City project starts to live up to its billing as Johnson pulls the strings
When manchester City's owner Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed al Nahyan came to town for the first time last night to check on his investment it would not be overstating it to say that the club felt obliged to deliver a result for their benefactor. Judging by the strained expressions around him in the directors' box this was one occasion that could not fall victim to the curse of the City cock-up.
In the end, the chairman Khaldoon Al-Mubarak, Roberto Mancini, Garry Cook, City's CEO, and all the other suits who surrounded his excellency had nothing to worry about. Like an errant puppy, City have a nasty habit of disgracing themselves at the worst possible time but yesterday they came good when the occasion required.
Mancini's side played like a team of international superstars rather than the fractious individuals they have proved to be at certain times over the two years of the Sheikh's reign in east Manchester. They demolished a Liverpool team that looked totally out of sorts and without Javier Mascherano missed some of the familiar midfield bite.
Without the head-dress and flowing robes that he wears in the few pictures of him that existed before last night, the Sheikh, in a navy suit, looked disarmingly young as he took his place to applause from the crowd. There was more than a touch of amusement about him as he waved to a thankful Mancunian public and he seemed to watch with the good humour required to be a City supporter.
Perhaps this result indicates that things are changing at the club and, at long last, the home support will not have to watch games through their fingers in anticipation of the another calamity. Because if there was one team who looked liable to crumble then it was Liverpool for whom this game was over when City scored their third with 23 minutes left to play.
The presence of the Sheikh was a harsh reminder to Liverpool that the individual who might rescue them from their current decline has not yet surfaced yet. Kenny Huang and his China consortium is already just a memory and the prospect of a new owner coming in now to do a deal for Liverpool in time for Roy Hodgson to get any leverage in the transfer market before the end of the month are remote in the extreme.
Unfortunately, Liverpool are not just failing to buy, they are also becoming a selling club. Mascherano's absence was telling last night but it is the symbolism of his departure that is another blow to the status of the club. Once upon a time in the history of this club the notion that a player would not be "in the right frame of mind" to play for Liverpool – as Hodgson described the Argentine last night – would have been anathema.
Mascherano did not look like the only one at times. Martin Skrtel was badly-exposed by Adam Johnson, first when he drew the Slovakian into a foul that resulted in an early booking and then won a penalty from him in the second half. Fernando Torres was substituted before the end of the match having hardly made a mark on the game.
These are early days yet for Liverpool and, in Arsenal and Manchester City, they have hardly been blessed with the easiest two opening fixtures. Against Arsenal they played a half with 10 men, last night they had the inconvenience of Mascherano's absence to contend with. Even so these are the kind of clubs with title ambitions against whom Liverpool must measure themselves.
drive from www.independent.co.uk
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