Manchester City’s Premier League title defence is hanging in the balance after they were held to a 2-2 draw by Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park on Saturday.
With the Merseyside derby postponed at lunchtime, there was the opportunity for City to close the gap on league leaders Liverpool to six points with a victory, but in the end they needed equalisers from Erling Haaland and then Rico Lewis – who was later sent off – to even take a point off Palace. Coty now sit eight points adrift of the pacesetters in fourth.
City’s run of five away defeats in a row is over but that stat will be of little comfort to Pep Guardiola, who saw his side fail to build on the midweek win over Nottingham Forest.
Liverpool, of course, can extend their advantage over the title holders with their game in hand, while Arsenal and Chelsea, both a point ahead of City, can pull away when they play London derbies live on Sky Sports on Sunday.
Amid the cold, wind and rain in south London, City were immediately up against it when Daniel Munoz fired in Palace’s early opener after a smart pass from Will Hughes exposed the visitors’ defence. After scoring his first for the club last weekend, he now has two in two at Selhurst.
Haaland’s equaliser on the half-hour mark came just moments after Ruben Dias had made a crucial block on Jefferson Lerma’s smashed shot in the box and City’s defence had been jittery and fortunate not to be punished again when unmarked Ismaila Sarr blasted over from the edge of the box.
But with Kevin De Bruyne starting again for City, there was threat in the final third, with the Belgian playing Haaland in for a one-on-one which Dean Henderson somehow kept out with his face before Ilkay Gundogan volleyed against a post and Savinho sent the follow-up wastefully wide.
Haaland’s looping header from Matheus Nunes’ cross – keeping up his streak of always scoring against Palace in the Premier League – should have been the platform for City to go on and assert their authority but their possession was ineffective at the start of the second half and instead they were behind again when Lacroix leapt above the rooted Kyle Walker to head in Palace’s second.
There was a flash of City at their best for the second equaliser, with De Bruyne and Bernardo Silva involved to play in Lewis for a cleverly disguised finish. It was his third Premier League goal and all of them have come against Palace.
But he will not remember this one fondly. After picking up a booking for dissent, he was wrongly dismissed by ref Rob Jones when Trevoh Chalobah caught him in a collision. VAR could not get involved as it was a yellow-card call.
Down to 10, City created nothing of note in the final moments. The win over Forest gave City hope – but this was a painful reminder they have a lot of work to do to return the levels needed to mix it in this title race.
As for Palace, it’s now just one loss in eight in all competitions and things are looking up for Oliver Glasner’s side, who sit 16th, four points above the drop zone.
Sky sports
