City Start off the year flat with a goalless draw

 Amar Zukancic

On New Year’s Day city went to the Stadium of Light and left feeling bitter with a goalless draw. The result of the match was about what the performance deserved. While being a very strong and formidable defensive performance from Sunderland, it was a very flat and passionless performance from Pep’s team. 

    The match started off slow, and from the first moment you knew we were in for a long day at the office. It seemed like Sunderland were getting to every 50/50 ball first, deflecting every pass, blocking every shot, and shutting down everything we tried. It was as if they knew what we were going to do before we did it. The only positives to bring from this match were the two returns made. Seeing the full return of Mr Balon’dor and Doku are going to be critical. Obviously Rodri wont be himself right away and Nico has been great, but getting even 50% of the Rodri we had before will do wonders for the team. And then having Doku back will be great. He was our 2nd best player to start the season, and although we’ve been winning we’ve missed him since the Madrid match.

 

Other than that there's not much to say. It was a flat and passionless performance and we don't have that sort of leeway when we're chasing a team in a title race. Back home now to take on Chelsea in a very big match.