Manchester City made the most of Chelsea’s slip to take over the top spot. They needed a 3-1 win at Watford to do so, but it was briefly shaky.
For Manchester United – former coach Solskjaer had to go – and almost also for Chelsea, promoted Watford had become a stumbling block in recent weeks – so the Citizens were warned. But they were also motivated: League leaders Chelsea had lost at West Ham in the afternoon, the champions could take over first place on their own merits.
In the live table he did that quite quickly: After Foden’s cross Sterling was completely blank in the five – headed in for 1:0 in the fourth minute. City had their usual dominance of the ball with the Hornets too. But they only sometimes allowed one-way football. After counter-attacks, the in-form Dennis was the first to have a promising finish (17th, 30th), but the equally in-form Bernardo Silva scored on the other side – for 2-0 (31st).
After Silva’s dream goal, the comeback is in the air
The visitors had already created chances for three or four goals in the first period – Grealish in particular was unfortunate – and after the restart they had clear advantages in this respect: Sterling failed to score against Bachmann (52.), Foden (59.) and Grealish (67.) against the aluminium. But Bernardo Silva ensured the preliminary decision in the meantime, with a dream goal right into the corner (63.)
The scare of the favourites seemed to be beaten, but came back again: Cucho straddled the line himself after hitting the post (74th) and soon after crossed to King, who narrowly missed the short corner – and thus the 2:3 (78th). Manchester City then regained control of the game – and for the three points, the top spot in the Premier League.