Yaya Toure has given his view on Gabriel Jesus, La La Land resurfaces and the fastest player in the Premier League is considered.
But first to Kevin De Bruyne, who went about his business in the usual quiet, calm and brilliantly effective way against the Hammers before spelling out City’s tactics for the rest of the campaign.
“’Football can go a little crazy sometimes,” he told reporters.
“‘They (Chelsea) are far ahead but even if you lose three games and win three games you are there. So three games out of the 17 is nothing.
“’So we just have to do our thing and not look at what Chelsea and the others are doing.
“‘If we win our games we will have a good place and hopefully the best possible.
“’We are going to try. In the Premier League you have to be there every week.
“‘All the injured players are coming bad which I am very happy about as we have a lot of games with the league and Champions League.’”
Next to Yaya Toure, who had the ultimate view of City’s dazzling forward trio of Raheem Sterling, Leroy Sane and Gabriel Jesus at the London Stadium from the base of midfield.
The Daily Star’s Dave Woods reports: “Ivory Coast ace Toure was left hugely impressed with the impact of Jesus, who kept 18-goal Sergio Aguero out of boss Pep Guardiola’s starting line-up at the London Stadium.
“’We have a fantastic player in him,” said the midfielder. ‘It was a fantastic performance from him to be honest.
“’He is a good guy and the most important thing is that he is going to learn English now.
“’He made an assist and scored a brilliant goal and with the manager we have he is only going to improve.
“’When players have the desire to play and to improve the message from the manager to all the players all the time is do what you want.
“’Gabriel has the desire, you don’t have to get him to fight. Sometimes other players can be rough, even dirty but he is tough.’”
Watch his goal in focus below
Over to the Irish Independent now and columnist James Lawton, who has penned an entertaining piece about the first part of Pep Guardiola‘s City reign and the enticing future ahead.
He reflects: “Sometimes you have to own up to an impertinence. You have to say you may have got it wrong. And, in this case, that perhaps football’s most celebrated coach might just know what he is doing.
“This was the dawning possibility this week while watching arguably the most fluent, integrated and luminous performance of the Premier League season.
“Two weeks ago it was said here that the author of this outpouring of truly exceptional football, Pep Guardiola, was inhabiting La La Land when taking his Manchester City team to the Oscar-nominated musical of that name in the wake of a most shocking 4-0 defeat at Everton. He would, it was suggested sternly, have been far better off digging up an old war movie. Something along the lines of ‘The Naked and the Dead’.
“However, who can now argue that there is not a powerful sense of resurrection in the air: regained bite, belief and a system of play that flowed with a wonderful, yet hard-edged, elegance.”
Well worth a read that one!
To another columnist now, and City’s bravura performance at West Ham got former Arsenal hard man Martin Keown’s creative juices flowing at the Daily Mail.
“City’s shape is like a flower coming into bloom and it relies on pace, quality and interchange of movement,” he wrote. “All of these things have to click into place. When all of the cogs are moving together, that is when the magic happens.
“At City, the pieces of the jigsaw are coming together and we are seeing a glimpse of a promising future. It is healthy for the Premier League that Guardiola has not arrived in England and conquered all before him. If he does, it will be his greatest achievement.”
Elsewhere, Frank Lampard called time on his illustrious playing career – which of course took in stints at City and New York City – and there has been blanket press coverage of his career.
Here’s a quirky look back at his career by way of a comparison with his old England midfield partner Steven Gerrard, via the BBC.
Finally we’ll throw a link in to a piece in the Daily Mirror analysing the fastest players in the Premier League - see how our boys fare!
We’ll have more from the papers and pixels tomorrow!
