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After beating Burton Albion F.C 1-0 in the second leg of the Carabao Cup semi final 2018-19, City were considered the favorites again for their FA Cup clash against Burnley on Saturday. As expected, Pep Guardiola's Manchester City breezed past Burnley by five goals to none, thereby maintaining their title challenge across all four competitions that they're competing in right now. City had 10 shots on target as compared to none by the visitors.
It was Kevin de Bruyne who shone the brightest among a whole bunch of stars in the sky-blue outfit, accounting for a goal and an assist each.
Gabriel Jesus, Bernardo Silva and Sergio Aguero were the other goalscorers, Burnley further undone by a Kevin Long own-goal. Interestingly, the league fixture involving both clubs in the same venue, back in October finished with the same scoreline as yesterday.
Here are some talking points after the game at Wembley:
#1 Four trophies still a possibility for City
As Pep Guardiola himself said, a quadruple was a "huge fantasy" for City, but the mavericks are still at a stage where they can achieve it as per their latest form and standings.
Manchester City is just four points behind English Premier League leaders Liverpool, having also progressed into the round-of-16 in the UEFA Champions League as one of the better sides. The EFL Cup and the FA Cup look like they are going City's way, while it might be a difficult, yet doable, job to catch up with the Merseyside Reds in the league. A UCL win would be a first ever for the club, but the side is actually strong enough to pose a challenge for it.
It has been years since a treble happened across Europe's best footballing leagues, and City is one team which can definitely break the jinx.
#2 Kevin de Bruyne, the man, the myth, the master
The strawberry-blonde Belgian delivered yet another clinical performance yesterday, proving that he is one of the most vital cogs in Pep Guardiola's system. Burnley simply could not stop his advances as he kept on writing his own rulebook on the pitch.
In case there were doubts regarding his importance to the team, his absence between November 2018 and early January 2019 certainly proved doubters wrong, as City suffered a string of underwhelming results. It was during this phase when Kevin de Bruyne was out with injury that the Manchester club gave away a lead of 4 points to Liverpool.
Yesterday, de Bruyne's was a really sublime display. For starters, he teed up City's second goal by assisting Bernardo Silva, before going on to fire one in all by himself from 25 yards out. He also made intelligent runs and kept churning pinpoint passes across the pitch.
#3 Under par efforts from Burnley
City's win was not just their win, but Burnley's loss as well. Burnley set some abysmal standards going forward in the game, but as rightly pointed out by many, the game would have been different had Matej Vydra utilised his one golden chance just before half-time.
A shocker of a mispass from City defender Nicolas Otamendi found Vydra as he pounced forward and attempted a shot, only for the ball to rattle into the side netting. City were leading just by 1-0 then, and an equalizer would really have pulled the game back in favour of the visitors. Vydra's shot was also one of the very few chances that Burnley created throughout the game, largely due to their own inability rather than City's defensive prowess.
De Bruyne and co. added to the hosts' lead in the second half, and it was game over for Burnley long before the final whistle.
#4 Gabriel Jesus in red-hot form
The young Brazilian attacker is in good nick, as far as the year so far is concerned.
Gabriel Jesus has scored eight goals in his last five outings with the club across competitions, as Manchester City makes it a point to score a lot of goals and hammer its opponents, while carving out a way forward across different competitions.
In fact, City have scored a total of 29 goals in 8 games since Liverpool's third goal against them from earlier this year, and moving forward, it is a good sign for the Sky-Blues to score a lot of goals and stay on the winning side.
Jesus continued his fine form with a well taken goal against Burnley in the 23rd minute which eventually opened the flood gates for the visitors. Guardiola would need his no.33 to fire on all cylinders if City are to mount a challenge for the quadruple.
