Manchester City make title statement against Chelsea

It was the first time that the Chelsea boss decided to substitute the central defender in an EPL match.

“I am very proud of this team”.

Aguero spearheaded the ground game this Sunday with his goal at 32 minutes, as he connected to perfection with a pass by Ivorian Yaya Toure, which he received in the red area, penetrated and evaded Bosnian Asmir Begovic with a clean definition.

“In the end I have to be happy with the second half we did because it is not easy to be losing 1-0 and play the way we did in the second half”.

Mourinho may have been irked with the result but City chief Manuel Pellegrini said: “Our team played better and 3-0 is the minimum we deserved”.

“If the 1-0 was a doubtful result at minute 70, 75, the 3-0 is completely fake because at 1-0 Chelsea was the better team in the second half”.

JOSE MOURINHO last night slammed his Chelsea defence and insisted he was right to haul off skipper John Terry.

“I had to decide on John or (Gary) Cahill because Zouma is the fastest player we have in our defensive line”, Mourinho explained of his decision to hook Terry.

Such was Mourinho’s concern that he substituted Terry – the first time that has happened in 177 matches as Chelsea manager.

The headline also suggests (incorrectly) that Blues midfielder Ramires should not have seen his second-half effort that rippled City’s net ruled out for offside.

The former Stoke City goalkeeper then made two saves in quick succession to deny Aguero, making a superb 17th-minute stop low to his left before producing an nearly identical save to keep out another effort by the City striker 60 seconds later. I hope in the next couple of games we do that.

“These players are hungry and angry”.

“We dominated and when they feel they are in trouble, and they felt (that), they changed Aguero and (Raheem) Sterling, they try to recover control of the game”.

The Chelsea website went on to say that Eliaquim Mangalam “resorted to WWE-style tactics to stop the ever-dangerous Diego Costa getting free down the right”.

That poor display was overshadowed by Mourinho’s removal of club doctor Eva Carneiro from bench duty after describing her as “naive” for tending to Eden Hazard – leaving Chelsea temporarily reduced to nine men.