Football – Manchester City halved Arsenal’s lead at the top of the Premier League with a 3-0 home defeat of Fulham and Aston Villa stayed in the frame with a late 1-0 victory at home to Brighton and Hove Albion yesterday.
Nottingham Forest squandered a chance to put some distance between themselves and the bottom three as they drew 0-0 at home to bottom club Wolverhampton Wanderers. Second-from-bottom Burnley pulled off a remarkable 3-2 comeback win at Crystal Palace to boost their slender survival hopes.
City have little margin for error in their pursuit of leaders Arsenal, who are away at Brentford today, but produced a clinical display to dispose of Fulham.
Three goals in a 15-minute spell in the first half secured the points for Pep Guardiola’s side who moved on to 53 points from 26 games, three behind leaders Arsenal.
Antoine Semenyo poked City ahead in the 24th minute and then set up Nico O’Reilly with a pinpoint pass for the second.
Phil Foden then found Erling Haaland who dispatched a shot for his 22nd league goal of the campaign.
Villa’s slender title chances appeared to be ebbing away as they laboured at home against Brighton.
But they secured the points when Brighton’s Jack Hinshelwood scored into his own goal after 86 minutes. Brighton midfielder James Milner, 40, came off the bench for his 653rd top-flight appearance, equalling Gareth Barry’s record.
Forest had a remarkable 35 goal attempts against Wolves at the City Ground but none of them found the back of the net as Sean Dyche’s side dropped two important points.
The draw left them in 17th place, only three points above third-from-bottom West Ham United.
Burnley ended a 16-game winless streak in remarkable fashion at Selhurst Park.
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