Manchester City back to winning ways, hold determined Chelsea 2-1

Manchester City defeated Chelsea 2-1  on Saturday evening to return to winning ways in the Premier League. The result puts City just a point behind Leicester City and nine points behind Liverpool on the table. 

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Champion mentality

All three goals of the match came in the first half, with Kevin De Bruyne and Riyad Mahrez scoring for City, whereas N'Golo Kante scored the goal for the Blues. The two-time defending Champions were assertive throughout the match, but it was not easy to hold Frank Lampard's determined side. 

After the match, City manager Pep Guardiola said, "We scored a goal when they were better. Normally we believe to score you have to be better, but they were in that moment." Speaking on the opposition, he said. "With the problems we have with injuries, we beat an incredible, top side. I judge managers on courage to play and Chelsea are [courageous]. They have a fantastic team. [It is a] great victory for us and we will see.”

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Goalscorer, De Bryune said, "They work hard; they can keep the ball. They're doing really well. It's difficult to win the ball back from them. Maybe they had a little more of the ball but we created the better chances so we deserved to win, I guess. It shows the other side we have – we can control the game while defending."

Lampard, on the other hand, also spoke about the brave performance and said, "Coming into the game, our recent form and how we’re developing quickly, I wanted to come here and be brave, to compete, to be brave on and off the ball. In the first half you saw all of that from us. At 1-0 we have relative control of the game. We didn’t have that little bit of quality in the final third. They had a couple of moments but we were playing well. Throughout the game there were a lot of positives, but we lost and it shows you at this level the finer details in both boxes are what decide these ones."

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Chelsea are now fourth on the table with 26 points from 13 games, two points behind Man City. 

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