On Monday, March 14th, 2022 Crystal Palace was able to hold off Manchester City as they played to a draw with a final tally of 0 to 0 at the electric Selhurst Park Stadium in this English Premier League match. Manchester City previously enjoyed a 13 – point lead in the English Premier League (EPL) just 2 – months ago. By the next time the defending champions play, they may find themselves sitting in 2nd – place in the English Premier League.
This provides the current 2nd – place club in the EPL, Liverpool, even more hope of catching up to Pep Guardiola’s squad this season and regaining the largest prize in English football.
Chelsea’s football club presently sits in 3rd – place in the English Premier League table at the moment.
Manchester City expanded their lead over Liverpool in the English Premier League to just 4 – points although Liverpool will play 2 – times, the 1st one versus Arsenal on Wednesday, March 16th, 2022, prior to Manchester City getting back in to league action once again on Saturday, April 2nd, 2022. In terms of a tie breaker, Liverpool has a better goal differential than Manchester City as well.
Liverpool and Manchester City will face off at the Etihad Stadium on Sunday, April 10th, 2022.
It just so happens that Crystal Palace was the last club to shut out Manchester City’s scoring in the English Premier League back on Saturday, October 30th, 2021 via a 2 to 0 victory at the Etihad Stadium, and Crystal Palace managed to make that happen again on Monday, even if Patrick Vieira’s side came out extremely lucky.
Joao Cancelo and Kevin De Bruyne got off very strong shots on goal that hit the post for Manchester City during a match that was primarily dominated by Manchester City who’s one – way traffic of the ball aside from only a small handful of some intermittent as well as dangerous counter – attacks by Crystal Palace which was really similar to their previous match – up paralleling what transpired during these two team’s meeting back in October of last year.
Questionably the greatest goal scoring opportunity of the contest went to Manchester City’s midfielder Bernardo Silva, who someway was able to get off a nice shot that ended up missing wide from approximately just 2 – meters out after Jack Grealish sent over a low centering pass right in front of the net.
The manager of Manchester City’s football club, Guardiola, decided not to make any substitutions during this match as he explained that he was content with the manner in which his squad was playing even though the frustration on the Manchester City side was visibly obvious during the last 15 – minutes of this English Premier League game.
Following this contest Silva persisted to remain confident regarding Manchester City’s current situation with only 9 – matches left for them this EPL season.
“Still a long way to go,” the Manchester City midfielder Bernardo Silva explained. “We are still in a good position. It’s still better to be in our position than Liverpool’s. They still have to play in our stadium as well. It’s going to be exciting.”
Liverpool has all of the momentum at the moment though. While they have come out victorious during their last 8 – matches in the English Premier League, Manchester City has left points on the table over 3 of their past 7 – games including a 1 to 1 draw at Southampton back in January of 2022 as well as a 3 to 2 Manchester City loss at home versus Tottenham Hotspur about a month ago.
Liverpool’s grander striking firepower of their strong forwards can possibly prove to be the difference as Manchester City once again demonstrated that they were lacking a cutting edge vs. Crystal Palace on Monday, March 14th, 2022.
Crystal Palace’s manager, Vieira, was extremely proud of how his team collectively remained strong and disciplined against one of, “the best four or five teams in Europe.”
“It was a team effort and our performance was really good,” the head coach of Crystal Palace Patrick Vieira disclosed.“When you play against the quality of players they have, you need a bit of luck at times and at times we were lucky but you also need to perform as well.”
Sources:
The Associated Press News Services. “City held by Palace, gives Liverpool hope in EPL title race”. The Associated Press. March 14, 2022.
ESPN News Services. “English Premier League Table 2021 – 22”. ESPN. March 14, 2022.
