By Ethan Aspinall, Fri 29 August 2025 11:13
Manchester City 0 Tottenham Hotspur 2: match reportCity slump to defeat against Spurs in the first home game of the season
Manchester City welcomed Tottenham Hotspur to the Etihad Stadium on Saturday afternoon for their first home match of the season. Coming off the back of an impressive 4-0 victory away at Wolves the week before. Spurs had also started the season well, having beaten Burnley 3-0 in their first game. It was a changed lineup for the Blues – Trafford started in goal, Ait Nouri, Dias, Stones, and Rico Lewis were the back 4. Reijnders, Gonzalez, and Cherki started in midfield and the attack was led by Marmoush, Bobb, and Haaland.
City made a strong start to the match with pressure on the Tottenham defence with a range of chances being made. Marmoush found himself through on goal from a tight angle but dragged the ball slightly wide. A cross in from Bobb to Haaland went above the goal as the Norwegian couldn’t get the cross right. Cherki contributed somewhat in attack and made some good moves and crosses into the box but were all met with responses from the organised Tottenham defence and City couldn’t make a breakthrough. Perhaps the greatest chance for Blues came around the 30 minute mark when Haaland displayed some good footwork dribbling through the midfield before proceeding to play Marmoush through on goal but the shot was straight to Vicario who parried the ball away.
It was from this point onwards that things went downhill for City. A few moments later, caught on the counterattack once again, Richarlison found the ball down the wing and crossed the ball into Johnson who knocked it in to give Tottenham the lead. The flag initially went up for offside, but it was then overturned by VAR and City once again found themselves trailing to Spurs. Problems worsened moments later when City goalkeeper Trafford had the ball at his feet, he chose to make the short pass to Dias but it was far too slow and the ball was intercepted by Richarlison who attempted to shoot but after a brief recovery, the ball fell to Palihna who knocked the ball in to give Tottenham a 2-0 lead before half time.
The second half played out like a slow sleepwalk all the way to defeat for the Blues. Spurs had complete control in the game and were very physically compact with no way through for City. Even in events of defensive mistakes from Tottenham, the Blues couldn’t capitalise such as when a miscommunication early in the second half led to a major chance for City who couldn’t take advantage, with Haaland choosing to pass instead of taking a shot on goal himself. Despite all of City’s efforts there was no way through and Tottenham tamed the City threat, had thorough control of the midfield and still looked threatening to City’s defence. A deserved 2-0 victory for the away side and perhaps a sobering wake-up call for the Blues.
City now stand at 6th in the table and will face Brighton away next weekend. This performance perhaps serves as a reminder that a turn of a corner has not been completed just yet for City and there is still work to be done if they want to banish the demons of last season. With the transfer window going into its final week, City face uncertainty about departures and incomings but one thing is that this rebuild could take some time to flourish and the Blues potentially currently remain in a transition period.
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