Manchester City 2 Bayern Munich 0

Champions League Group A
Wednesday 7 December 2011, 19.45 KO

City: Hart, Savic, Lescott, Kompany (c), Clichy, Barry, Y Toure (Balotelli 81), Nasri, Silva (A Johnson 85), Aguero, Dzeko (de Jong 78)
Unused: Pantilimon, K Toure, Zabaleta, Milner
Goals: Silva (36), Y Toure (52)
Booked: -

Referee: Stephane Lannoy
Man of the Match: Gareth Barry

City knew that only a win would do if they were to stand any chance of making the knock-out stages of the Champions League and, seeing the visitors rest a few players, the hosts set out to attack from the off. Aguero should have opened the scoring with just eight minutes on the clock as Nasri found him unmarked in the box, but his header was over the bar and into the fans.

Bayern could have taken the lead shortly after, but a comfortable save from Hart at his near post saw the ball bounce behind for a corner. Lescott had the ball in the Bayern net on 16 minutes, but it was eventually ruled out by the referee for a foul on the goalkeeper. The assistant on the line didn’t see it, the assistant behind the goal didn’t see it, but the referee thought long and hard before disallowing the defender’s header from Nasri’s free kick.

Alaba skied the ball over the bar when faced with Joe Hart, before the home side took the lead. A ball from deep from Barry was cutely flicked to Silva by Dzeko. The Spaniard took the ball on his chest and volleyed it from the edge of the box, finding the bottom corner with force.

It was all City: Barry lifted an effort of the bar when there were shouts of handball, Aguero took on and beat the whole Bayern defence to shoot past Butt – though ex-City defender Boateng got back to clear from behind his goalkeeper – and Aguero curled an effort just wide of the post from inside the box.

The first action of the second half saw the hosts double their advantage. Yaya Toure nipped in ahead of the Bayern defence to a Dzeko through ball and he poked the shot under Butt. It was neat, flowing football, but it was dulled by the news the Napoli had taken the lead in Spain, putting them through and City out as it stood.

Nevertheless, the home side continued to press and look for more goals. Nasri smashed a shot just wide of the post after Aguero and Dzeko had worked the ball across to him on the right flank, before Barry volleyed an effort from the edge of the box as a corner was half-cleared, but Butt got two strong hands on it to push it away.

It was an excellent performance from City and they did what they could to influence qualification on the night, but it turned out not to be enough, with Napoli winning at Villarreal. The opening draw with the Italians and the defeat in Naples were the killers, but the City fans got a performance to be proud of in going out of the competition.