Manchester City edged closer to winning this season’s Premier League title with a hard-fought victory over Aston Villa on Wednesday, April 21.
The coach of the Premier League table toppers, Pep Guardiola, led City to Villa Park to play their 33rd game of the season. The visitors were slammed with a first-minute goal, courtesy of Villa’s John McGinn’s strike.
The goal which was netted in the 20.82 seconds of the match was the second-fastest goal of the Premier League season.
Despite the shocking first-minute goal, Manchester City fought back until they got their equalizer in the 22nd minute, courtesy of Phil Foden’s strike. Before the end of the first half, Manchester City took the lead for the first time in the game in the 40th minute.
To the dismay of coach Guardiola, City received a big blow when John Stones was shown the red card for a rough tackle in the 44th minute.
In the second half, Manchester City and Aston Villa were not able to do much. Even when Villa’s Matt Cash received two yellow cards within three minutes (54 and 57) and got sent off from the game, City were not able to increase their goals tally. Hence the game ended 2-1 in favor of City.
Victorious at Villa! 🎥
— Manchester City (@ManCity) April 21, 2021
🔷 #ManCity | https://t.co/axa0klD5re pic.twitter.com/hLTLCHuuSZ
At the end of the game, the coach of Aston Villa, Dean Smith, expressed unhappiness over the red card Cash received in the second half of the game. He blamed Cash for being sent off and described the offense the player committed that led to the second yellow card as “stupid and reckless”.
“I thought the first yellow was harsh, the second was stupid and reckless. You won’t have a better chance of 11 vs 10 against Man City.
“I thought their red was a yellow as well though. I think you can slow anything down and make it look worse than it is. He’s gone for the ball and got the man, you see that all of the time.
“We planned to go out there, play behind them and get it into the front two. I thought it was a bit more even at 10 v 10, but they’ve got better technically-gifted players than we do on the ball.”
While the manager of Manchester City said: “It was not the best start that we imagined. We reacted incredibly well, we played so well. That was a really good performance. We knew how important it was, the Premier League is the most important title of the year.”
When will Manchester City win the Premier League title?
Currently, Manchester City have 5 games to play before the 2020-2021 season ends. They are currently occupying the first spot of the league table with 77 points in 33 games, 11 points away from second-placed Manchester United.
As it stands, Manchester City need at least 8 points to be declared the winner of this season’s Premier League which means that once they win two games and draw two out of their remaining 5 games, they will be declared champions of the league.
Hence, if Manchester City win their next three Premier League games, they will be champions of the league on 15 May 2021 after victory over Brighton.
