Tottenham 1, Manchester City 0
Harry Kane became Tottenham’s all time record goal scorer as he scored to help 10-man Tottenham beat Manchester City.
Embed from Getty ImagesKane has hit a remarkable 267 goals for Spurs, taking over the record from Jimmy Greaves, and also becoming the fastest player to reach 200 Premier League goals.
Victory will be bittersweet for Spurs – who went down to ten men late on after Cristian Romero was sent off for two bookable offences – the result helps keep the 5 point gap between the Citizens and North London rivals Arsenal – who have a game in hand – at the top of the table.
And after a third consecutive away defeat in a row for the first time since 2016 City’s wretched record at the Tottenham Hotspur stadium now reads – five straight defeats and still no goals scored.
City boss Pep Guardiola summed up City’s poor day in London.
He said: “We started really well, but we made a mistake and they punished us.
“Sometimes we can come back like we did at the Etihad but today we dropped three points.
“It’s not easy when some players defend back. We missed maybe the last pass in the final third.
Guardiola admitted that he brought on Kevin De Bruyne to provide that last pass at a stadium which they have a terrible record since it opened.
He added: “Sooner or later it has to change [the record] – we have missed penalties here in the past – they have a good goalkeeper.
“We had a chance at the end but we could not score.
“Tottenham has a fantastic squad, team, and manager and they can punish you.
“We created chances but we lost, Spurs are a complete Champions league team and it’s not easy.”
Kyle Walker agreed that City couldn’t create the killer chance but insisted that players like Erling Haaland needed time to adapt to Pep Guardiola’s system.
“Certain things we could have done in and around the box to create a clear cut chance could have been better – we needed more shots on target.”
“Erling’s been fantastic, it’s no problem when he’s scoring goals but it’s a difficult team to fit into, the manager demands so much.”
City were entirely dominant in opening minutes but couldn’t prise Spurs apart – their hosts were actually aggressive throughout in pressing their opponents.
But they offered their hosts chances and Harry Kane soon opened the scoring after 15 minutes to become their all-time top scorer.
Rodri error gifts record goal to Harry Kane
Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg beat Rico Lewis to a poor pass out of defence by Rodri and fed Kane who could not miss.
While City continued to have a majority of possession Spurs looked more dangerous when they were on the ball as City lacked the defensive organisation they had in previous seasons.
City only had speculative efforts by Bernardo Silva and Rodri to show for their first half efforts while Spurs saw shots by Kane and Dejan Kulusevski blocked.
Riyad Mahrez saw a curling effort come off the underside of the crossbar and out.
Ben Davies headed over the bar from a corner as Spurs continued to look the more effective side in the second half.
And with City still looking insipid, De Bruyne finally made hs entrance after 59 minutes, with Mahrez making way and Bernardo Silva going to the right flank.
Alvarez’ defected shot cleared the crossbar from De Bruyne’s free kick while De Bruyne shot wide as City laid the pressure on.
Harry Kane arrived too late to connect to Cristian Romero’s pass into the six yard box as Spurs continued to threaten on the break.
Alvarez swept a 20 yard shot wide of the far post while Kane was denied by Ederson after going past Kyle Walker and shooting.
And although as many as eight City players had a shot on goal in the game, Erling Haaland was not one of those as he cut an isolated, frustrated figure.
Ilkay Gündoğan came on with 5 minutes to go for Bernardo Silva as City looked to rescue a point but they had to be wary of being hit on the break.
And Spurs went down to 10 when Romero was sent off for a second booking in cynically bringing down the lively Grealish who looked most likely to create something for the visitors while also putting in a defensive shift.
Kulusevski was immediately sacrificed for Davinson Sanchez as Spurs replenished their defence.
And there was no injury time penalty for City after Lloris clattered Rodri while both players went for the ball and the home side held on for the win.
TEAM NEWS
Pep Guardiola once again went with in-form players at the Tottenham Hotspur stadium where they had not won, or scored a goal, in four visits.
Ederson, Kyle Walker, Bernardo Silva, and Julian Alvarez came into the starting line-up.
They replaced Manuel Ortega, John Stones (hamstring), Ilkay Gündoğan, and Kevin De Bruyne.
Phil Foden felt unwell overnight and wasn’t included in the squad and Rico Lewis was stationed at left back following the departure of Joao Cancelo to Bayern Munich on loan.
Cristian Stellini took charge of team affairs after Tottenham boss Antonio Conte was recovering from surgery to remove his gall bladder.
Spurs were unchanged from their win over Fulham and that meant their new right wing-back Pedro Porro – an ex-Manchester City player – had to make do with a seat on the bench.