Defender Nicolas Otamendi scored the decider in the 54th minute to give Manchester City a 2-1 win against Manchester United in the English Premier League (EPL) fixture at the Old Trafford here on Sunday.
After David Silva gave lead to Manchester City in the 43rd minute, Marcus Rashford (45+2′) scored the goal nearing the end of first-half to make it 1-1 for Manchester United. However, Otamendi’s goal sealed the match for the visitors.
Now Manchester City with (46) are 11 points clear of Manchester United (35) who remained at the second spot in the EPL table after 16 matches.
Praising his side, City’s manager Pep Guardiola termed it to be an “outstanding” performance in the 175th Manchester derby.
“Amazing! We played outstanding,” said Guardiola, adding, “For us to come here to Old Trafford and play the way we played, trying to be patient and clever, controlling the counter-attack, I am delighted. I am happy with the way we played, we can win lose or draw but it’s important how we play.”
“We are not the best team in the world with set-pieces, but we scored two of them today. Football is incredible. We spoke about a lot of things this week about United but never about set-pieces! We are not the best at them!” Guardiola was quoted by www.mancity.com.
“We are an honest team, we had 80% average ball possession and that shows that we are here to play, and I am so satisfied with that. It means a lot in the way we played in terms of our confidence. We won points on Chelsea, Arsenal and now Manchester United, but in December, it’s impossible to be champions,” he added.
Guardiola also informed that skipper Vincent Kompany had picked up an injury, “Kompany is injured. I don’t know to what extent, we are waiting to see,” he said.
Meanwhile, City’s attacking midfielder Kevin De Bruyne said his focus now only was on the next match against Swansea.
“Lots of teams lost points this weekend so it is a big one for us just to put more pressure on the rest. We have to enjoy it and then focus again for Wednesday,” said the Belgian.
With inputs from agencies and official website of Manchester City