City dropped two points today as the inability to keep a clean sheet begins to take its’ toll.  It was an improvement on last year’s 3-1 loss.  But it was certainly disappointing to miss out on the opportunity to capitalise on the results going on around us this weekend.

We were happily informed by Shaun Goater’s ‘Read the Goat’ column in the match programme that he would be wearing his t-shirt, shorts, and flip-flops whilst watching the game in 70 degrees heat, just as it started p***ing down in Manchester.  At that point City announced what on paper looked to be a formidable attacking line-up with Petrov, Bellamy, Tevez, Adebayor all starting.  But the shape didn’t pay huge dividends, and it was clear that the raft of recent internationals has interrupted City’s learning curve.

After a dull start, the game had its’ first highlight in the 11^th minute when the Kippax identified a posh chap from Fulham in a pink jumper.  “Who’s the tranny in the pink?” was followed by variations on the same theme for a couple of minutes before the aforementioned posh chap, who to be fair acknowledged the City end with a hearty wave, became so embarrassed that he took his pink jumper off.  For all Fulham’s population of the away end looked pretty pathetic their dogged determination on the pitch certainly wasn’t.

Petrov was awarded with a start after his good performances and operated on both sides, swapping with Bellamy in order to take up corner-taking duties.  But the 10-man Fulham defence made it hard for City to stretch down the flanks, and the attack often found itself in a circular formation that lacked link play in the middle.   It could have been a setup that Ireland would have been more suited to in the berth alongside Barry. 

When the deadlock was finally broken in the 53^rd minute it was a scrappy goal that was awarded to Adebayor during the match, but seems to have been given to Lescott post-match.  Great link-up play then saw Petrov pick his spot with a superb finish to make it 2-0.  City were cruising and it looked like the floodgates might open.  However, they opened at the other end in five minutes of defensive madness. The warning signs were there for all to see when Zamora somehow missed from point blank after a series of defensive howlers saw Fulham dance into the box earlier in the match.  There was a lack of organisation in defence that needs to be resolved rapidly. 

Tevez and Bellamy led by example in their promotion of work-rate, Tevez regularly getting into the box to create chances, but it was telling that City had twenty-four (24) chances and only six were on target.  The benefit to the team provided by the ever-improving Bridge was more than wiped out by Micah Richards who was a passenger for most of the game. To be fair to him he did a job that would have been done by Zabaleta had he not been suspended, but it was an obvious area of weakness that Fulham did well to exploit.

Overall, a disappointment but not a catastrophe. As TLDORC blog rightly points out, the press will be on the lookout for a new crisis club now that Liverpool have beaten United.  We need to make sure it is not City, starting with Scunthorpe.

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