Manchester City 2 - 1 Chelsea: Chelsea pay the penalty

Published on Saturday 5 December 2009 23:21

Adebayor 37; Tevez 56 Adebayor OG 8

SHAY Given emerged a hero on both sides of Manchester by saving a late Frank Lampard penalty to give City a precious win over Chelsea and cut their advantage over United to two points.

Carlos Tevez's brilliant free-kick ultimately proved decisive after Emmanuel Adebayor had inadvertently put Chelsea in front, then cancelled out that own goal seven minutes before the interval.

However, that hardly told the story as bad tempered Chelsea went down in a hail of yellow cards – six in all – and skipper John Terry went off with a leg injury that will bring a moment of dread to Fabio Capello even if the damage is not too great.

The two first-half goals were certainly not in keeping with a pulsating opening in which City more than matched their highly-rated opponents without ever looking completely secure at the back.

Mark Hughes' men had already been given one warning when Given turned away Didier Drogba's angled drive.

Yet, when he looks at the replay, Hughes will probably conclude the main factor in Chelsea's opener was complete bad luck.

Drogba and Branislav Ivanovic could both have been more closely marked at the start of the scramble but City survived that lapse when Given made his first save.

The ball bounced back to Nicolas Anelka but Given got behind his shot too. However, the keeper could not legislate for the ball shooting upwards, striking Adebayor on the back and bobbling in.

As Chelsea should not have been awarded the corner which started the whole melee off in the first place, City could have been forgiven for believing it was not to be their day.

Far from it. They poured forward and if their delivery from set pieces had been less persistent in picking out Petr Cech, the equaliser might have come long before it did. Cech's only mistake had been to come for a Shaun Wright-Phillips' cross and get nowhere near as Micah Richards rose. Ricardo Carvalho read the situation perfectly though and made a splendidly acrobatic clearance.

City kept up their offensive and when Wright-Phillips drove another shot into the Chelsea box it ultimately brought their equaliser. The ball deflected into Adebayor's path and did so again when it bounced back off Terry. At the second time of asking Adebayor did not fail.

If Drogba's free-kick in the final minute of the half had been one inch inside Given's left-hand post rather than just outside it, City might have had problems responding.

As it was, they were the ones with the impetus when the sides returned and got their noses in front.

Carvalho had a point when he claimed he had been looking at the ball as he went for an aerial challenge with Tevez, but he also kept a leg in the air long enough to plant it into the Argentine's back.

Tevez added insult to the resulting yellow card though, curling a crisp free-kick into the bottom corner.

Juliano Belletti's studs-first challenge that led to Wayne Bridge being carried off could easily have left Chelsea with ten men. That bad-tempered tackle led to a few more, with Ashley Cole and Deco booked.

Prior to that, though, Given had emerged the hero when he turned away an admittedly poor Lampard penalty.

There was still time for Terry to limp off and Drogba to waste a glorious chance to level at the death although City, and Given, deserved their success.