Manchester City 2 - 0 Everton: Super Mario saves the day

Afterwards City captain Vincent Kompany praised his team for their patience in grinding out a 2-0 win at Etihad Stadium.

James Milner, like Balotelli a second-half substitute, sealed the points in the 89th minute after Everton had proved tough to break down for the first 67 minutes.

Kompany said: “We have never had an easy game against Everton. I thought defensively we looked good today and we’re really happy with the performance.

“We didn’t let ourselves get surprised. Sometimes it’s just a matter of patience and the goals will come.”

He continued: “We have played maybe one bad 45 minutes in the whole of the league – against Fulham away. Today we didn’t maybe impress but we did what we had to do.”

The Belgium defender had special words for man of the match David Silva, who hit the post, had a goal disallowed for offside and set up the clinching goal for Milner with a brilliant through-ball.

Kompany said of the Spain midfielder: “He’s nowhere near as good on the pitch as he is in the dressing room. He’s a great character to have around the team.”

As always, City had found it sticky going against the Toffeemen but Balotelli’s introduction after an hour changed all that, the Italian’s shot flying in off Phil Jagielka.

There could not be a greater contrast between City’s vast wealth and the relative hand-to-mouth existence of their north-west neighbours.

Yet Everton are a stoic bunch and, despite enduring another summer of fiscal austerity, manager David Moyes has engineered a decent start.

And, of course, there was that amazing record against City to protect. Since Sheikh Mansour completed his Blues buy-out in 2008, the clubs have met on six occasions. Everton have won five, including the last four, proving money cannot buy you everything.

Moyes’ masterplan this time was to send Jack Rodwell scurrying around after danger-man David Silva all afternoon, while Phil Neville and Seamus Coleman, tackled anything that moved.

For City neither Yaya Toure nor Samir Nasri imposed themselves on the contest and Everton keeper Tim Howard didn’t have a save to make until the 35th minute.

The American also denied Gareth Barry shortly afterwards as City began to turn the screw, although by the time referee Howard Webb blew his whistle for half-time, Everton were actually on top.

The hosts came close to opening their account straight after the restart when former City skipper Sylvain Distin turned Nasri’s dangerous cross behind.

With an hour gone, City manager Roberto Mancini turned to Balotelli, ahead of deposed skipper Carlos Tevez and a very astute move it turned out to be too.

Aguero was the architect of the 21-year-old Italian’s goal, crabbing in from the right flank before rolling the ball into Balotelli’s path.

Without a league goal since February, but becalmed after a pre-season row with his manager in the United States and a scorer in the midweek Carling Cup win over Birmingham, the Italy striker took aim, benefiting from a slight deflection off Jagielka as the ball nestled in the far corner.

Within a couple of minutes, Silva had almost made it two, drilling a low shot against the base of Howard’s left-hand post.

Milner eventually secured the win, racing onto Silva’s pass before keeping his nerve to beat Howard.