Sergio Aguero wheels away to celebrate after slotting home a late penalty that gave City victory over Borussia Monchengladbach
Sergio Aguero kicked off the Oktoberfest in Germany for us Cityzens by converting a penalty late in the 90th minute. It was a case of when and not if for City as we dominated the tie with 64% possession and 21 attempts on the Monchengladbach goal. Falling behind in the 56th minute was a big blow, but our lads showed great resolve as new boy Nicolas Otamendi half-volleyed home just eight minutes later. That goal galvanised the team and thus began the heavy shelling on the Germans, which culminated in the desperate lunge by Fabian Johnson on Aguero, who made no mistake in converting the resulting penalty to help the Blue Moon rise again.
It has been a rough month for myself and my fellow City fans as losses have been coming thick and fast after the outstanding start that we had to the season. During this time, we lost our man-mountain Vincent Kompany to injury while hitman Sergio Aguero embarked on a goal drought. These two factors, along with the time taken by Nicolas Otamendi to settle in, led to a leakage of goals, against opposition that we’re supposed to beat without breaking a sweat. Instead, we were defeated by West Ham, and last week, Tottenham Hotspur, who picked us apart in a very City-esque manner. The Juventus defeat was also a bit hard to take in, considering the form we were in before that.
Nicolas Otamendi celebrates with Raheem Sterling after scoring City’s equaliser on the night
The future though, looks pretty promising. Otamendi has finally bought into the City philosophy of playing football. He showed against Monchengladbach what he is capable of and why we paid so much to secure his services in the first place. Kevin De Bruyne, our record signing, is also proving his worth.
The Belgian has played an important part in all the matches that he has featured in since signing, and it was no different last night. He has also featured on the score sheet quite a few times, although we ended up losing whenever that happened, but that sort of hoodoo doesn’t last long. Raheem Sterling has also been a revelation since making his controversial switch from Merseyside. Therefore, our problem of aging players looks to have been solved to an extent.
Lars Stindl opened the scoring on the night as he side footed the ball past Joe Hart from close range
A win in the UEFA Champions League is always special, that too away in Germany against solid opposition. The victory is even more sweeter as we are being seen as one of the few teams in England who are tipped to succeed in a European competition. Moving forward, we have Newcastle and Bournemouth at home as our next two Barclays Premier League fixtures.
Wins in these games should get our campaign back on track. Our next European tie is against Sevilla at home which should be a tricky fixture, but once we’re done with that, we have our derby against our cross town rivals. That is always the most awaited tie of the season for either club and it should be even more hotly contested this time around as we intend to wrestle back the top position from them to make sure that the Noise returns to the Etihad once again.
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