New Delhi: After going through a horrible period since November, Manchester City have gotten their 2025 off to an explosive start. Hosting West Ham United in their first Premier League game of the new year, Manchester City looked to build on their comfortable away win over Leicester City and they did exactly that against Julen Lopetegui’s team, piling more pressure on the West Ham manager.
They started the game in dominating fashion and quickly made that dominance count as Savinho, who scored his first goal for the club last weekend, forced an own goal through Vladimir Coufal setting the platform for Manchester City’s win. Erling Haaland would then add two more before Phil Foden joined in on the act to make it 4-0 for the hosts before West Ham striker Niklas Fullkrug pulled one back for his side.
🔙 After 14 games, Manchester City are back to winning two consecutive games. pic.twitter.com/C8BPLaIcrd
— Fabrizio Romano (@FabrizioRomano) January 4, 2025
Manchester City held on till the final whistle though and wrapped up the three points with a 4-1 win over the Hammers. This marked Pep Guardiola’s side’s first back-to-back win since October, before the start of their poor form. They scraped out narrow wins over the league’s then-bottom two clubs, Wolves and Southampton, winning 2-1 against the former and 1-0 against the latter.
Savinho and Erling Haaland shine once again
Erling Haaland & Savinho #MCIWHU pic.twitter.com/ntj0zF5XsZ
— H (@HQpcrt) January 4, 2025
The duo of Savinho and Haaland, who were instrumental in helping City put an end to their winless run against Leicester City last weekend, were once again at the forefront of things for the Cityzens. The Brazilian winger, who helped open the scoring on the night by forcing an own goal out of Coufal, then went on to grab two more assists for his side, helping Haaland reach his brace against the Hammers.
His assist for Haaland’s first goal of the game was a thing of beauty as he went around Coufal to get to the ball before floating in a brilliant cross in the box which Haaland headed into the empty net. Haaland then produced a neat finish for his second, picking up Savinho’s through ball in the box before chipping it over the onrushing Alphonse Areola. This also marked the first occasion in over four months that Haaland scored a brace.
The towering striker hadn’t scored two goals in a game since scoring a brace against Brentford in City’s 2-1 win over the Bees. Manchester City now look to be returning to the form that we had become accustomed to see from the defending champions and it comes at the right time for them. While their wins have come against struggling sides, they would do well to get them into form before a challenging run of fixtures that awaits them between January 25th and February 26th.
Defending Premier League champions seem to have put their awful run of form behind them after blowing West Ham away 4-1 in their latest Premier League fixture. Football Sports News: Latest Cricket News, Cricket Live Score, Sports Breaking News from Sports Today
