Manchester City delivered a dominant Champions League performance to sweep past Club Brugge 5-1 on Tuesday and re-emphasise their status as major contenders for a first European title.<\/p>\n
Joao Cancelo gave City a deserved lead on the half-hour and Riyad Mahrez converted a penalty just before the break as Pep Guardiola\u2019s side bounced back in style from last month\u2019s loss to Paris Saint-Germain.<\/span><\/p>\n Kyle Walker added a third early in the second half and 19-year-old Cole Palmer bagged his first Champions League goal minutes after coming on as a substitute.<\/span><\/p>\n Hans Vanaken pulled a goal back to great delight from the home supporters but Mahrez capped a thumping City victory with his second of the night.<\/span><\/p>\n The win leaves City side with six points after three games in Group A, with the champions of England and Belgium to meet again in two weeks in Manchester.<\/span><\/p>\n Ederson returned in goal for City after flying direct to Belgium last week following Brazil\u2019s 2022 World Cup qualifiers, while Jack Grealish replaced Raheem Sterling in the front three.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Viewed as\u00a0the weakest team in a group also featuring 2020 semi-finalists RB Leipzig, Brugge had surprisingly held PSG to a 1-1 draw in their opening game of the section at the Jan Breydelstadion.<\/span><\/p>\n City, facing Brugge for the first time, twice had the ball in the net inside the opening 15 minutes. Grealish\u2019s lob was ruled out for a push on Clinton Mata, with Rodri\u2019s tap-in disallowed for offside.<\/span><\/p>\n Phil Foden fired into the side-netting after running onto a long ball, the England international\u2019s free roaming as a false nine constantly troubling Brugge.<\/span><\/p>\n It came as little surprise Foden created the opening goal for Cancelo, chipping a delightful ball over the defence that the Portugal defender poked through the legs of former Liverpool goalkeeper Simon Mignolet.<\/span><\/p>\n Stanley Nsoki chopped Mahrez down in the area late in the first half, the Algerian doubling City\u2019s lead as he sent Mignolet the wrong way from the spot.<\/span><\/p>\n Mahrez nearly struck again before half-time but Mignolet beat away his first-time strike from Foden\u2019s lay-off.<\/span><\/p>\n Walker all but put the match out of reach on 53 minutes when Mahrez and Kevin De Bruyne combined, the latter rolling through for Walker to drill low past Mignolet.<\/span><\/p>\n Mignolet denied Foden with his legs as City continued to stream forward. Not even a spate of changes could check their momentum as Palmer scored three minutes after replacing De Bruyne.<\/span><\/p>\n No sooner had Belgium star De Bruyne walked off to warm applause from the home supporters than Palmer curled in from Raheem Sterling\u2019s assist.<\/span><\/p>\n Mignolet saved well from Sterling after he escaped in behind the defence, with Ederson producing a sharp stop to turn away Charles De Ketelaere\u2019s diving header.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Brugge refused to fold and Hans Vanaken steered in a consolation nine minutes from time, but the game finished as it started, with City flexing their muscle as Mahrez burst clear to complete the rout.<\/span><\/p>\n AFP<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Manchester City delivered a dominant Champions League performance to sweep past Club Brugge 5-1 on Tuesday and re-emphasise their status as major contenders for a first European title. Joao Cancelo gave City a deserved lead on the half-hour and Riyad Mahrez converted a penalty just before the break as Pep Guardiola\u2019s side bounced back in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5571,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[3391,1592,3390],"class_list":["post-5570","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-club-brugge","tag-man-city","tag-ucl"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5570"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5570"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5570\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5572,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5570\/revisions\/5572"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5571"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5570"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5570"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5570"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}