Quite how this game went in favour of the visitors is a mystery, but sloppy first-half defending gave West Ham a two-goal advantage that, despite Kevin De Bruyne pulling one back, they protected in spite of a fierce second-half onslaught by the Blues.
City will play worse this season but still win comfortably - it was that sort of game
...City v West Ham...
With Manuel Pellegrini keen to keep as settled a side, the changes made from the 2-1 defeat by Juventus were mostly forced rather than cosmetic. David Silva was withdrawn as late as half-an-hour before kick-off with the reason unknown, though it wasn’t believed to be a major issue. Jesus Navas deputised.
Nicolas Otamendi was handed a full debut along with Kevin De Bruyne, but this was mostly due to the injuries Samir Nasri suffered in midweek.
Sergio Aguero also returned to the starting XI having been declared fully fit as City looked to record a twelfth successive league win and maintain their 100% record against a West Ham side that had already taken the scalps of Liverpool and Arsenal on the road this season.
On an unseasonably warm Manchester late afternoon, City were almost ahead on four minutes as Fernandinho thundered a header goalwards from a De Bruyne corner, but Adrian instinctively beat the effort out - a foot either side and the Blues would have been ahead - instead, within two minutes, West Ham were ahead.
There seemed no obvious danger as the visitors approached the City penalty area, but with a glimpse of goal in his sights, Victor Moses lashed a low drive from 20 yards that beat Joe Hart and end the Blues’ run of six consecutive clean sheets in the league.
City very nearly levelled three minutes later as De Bruyne’s cross-field pass was headed by a Hammers defender into the path of Aguero who nipped past Adrian but saw his attempt to beat the two men chasing back towards the goal was perhaps too hasty and the ball ran wide of the far post.
The Blues continued to press for an equaliser but the final ball was often lacking in and around the box and instead of finding a way back into the game, events took a turn for the worse when a West Ham corner was poorly defended and in the ensuing scramble Diafra Sakho poked the ball home from close range.
It seemed the Hammers were about to add the league leaders to their impressive list of away triumphs
...Match report...
With West Ham squeezing every available second from dead-ball situations, the home support were growing increasingly frustrated, but as the first-half drifted into added time, at last lifeline as Aguero’s clever pass found De Bruyne on the edge of the box and the Belgian drilled sweet low shot past Adrian to halve the deficit.
With Martin Demichelis replacing Eliaquim Mangala at half-time, City came out with their tails up looking to restore parity as quickly as possible and the first 15 minutes resembled a siege as the Blues created chance after chance with either Adrian, poor finishing or desperate defending preventing a second goal.
Yaya Toure twice had excellent chances, one blocked the other saw his low drive miss the target by inches and more and more, it looked like just being ‘one of those days’.
It was incredible - the Hammers somehow repelled everything City threw at them and all the while the clock ticked ominously towards full-time.
In fact, the longer the hosts’ dominance continued without reward, the more obvious it became that this wasn’t the Blues’ day. It should have been, but the gods simply weren’t smiling on Pellegrini’s men on this occasion.
