Happy New Year for City

City 2 - 1 Everton

As a new year begins, so does another football fan blog. Some of you may recognise me from my time as a writer on the Vital Football website, but as we head into 2007, I will only be posting articles here on this blog from now on. Comments are very welcome, so please share your views whether they are in agreement or critical of mine, but please consider that children may be looking at the website when choosing your words. Now onto the footy .......

I think even the most optimistic Blues wouldn't have predicted City grabbing 9 points over the Xmas / New Year period, but I don't suppose many of use are complaining too loudly about it now.

The Xmas omens were not good at the Bolton game, during which we were just shocking. It was that bad, that by half time, I couldn't take any more and spared my two lads the torture of another 45 minutes. Little did I realize as I was trudging out of the ground with the storm clouds hovering over us, that we'd end up having one of the most sucessful festive-season run of games for many a year.

Incredibly, given our previous away form so far, we have won back-to-back games on the road against an in-crisis West Ham, despite the return of their prodigal son, and against a rough and tough Sheffield United, who are battling away to keep their Premiership status. Both those games were certainly not pretty, but the narrow 0-1 wins were nevertheless massive results for City.

Today's encounter against Everton was perhaps not the game we wanted in the pursuit of an unthinkable three match winning streak; I can't remember the last time that happened - perhaps one of you "Stattos" can?

As the first half unfolded and developed, thoughts were already turning towards another half-time exit; the quality (from both teams) was that dire. However, a tactical change at the break which saw Samaras replace an ineffective Corradi paid immediate dividends with a well worked goal involving an increasingly influential Beasley.

What a difference a goal makes! Samaras looked a totally different player and you could see his confidence an swagger returning at pace and then-some as he cooly converted a penalty after Vassell was felled by on-loan Rag Howard. City dominated the majority of the second half, and despite a late scare when Osman pulled a goal back with a quality finish, City held on pretty comfortably and stay remain in the top half of the table with clear water between us and the relegation places.

Although Big Sam will grab all the headlines, it was a good team performance today - well for the 2nd half anyway. Other performances of note included Dabo who looked rock solid in midfield, Beasley's trickery on the wing, Vassell running his socks off yet again and Onuoha looking an able replacement for Micah if recent rumours are to be believed but my own personal Man of the Match was Stephen Jordan who didn't put a foot wrong and never missed a tackle.

Well, what a great start to the year, but some tricky games ahead. Sheffield Wednesday away in the Cup is a potential banana-skin given our recent record against lower league clubs in Cup competitions. Local derbies against Bolton and Blackburn follow quickly and will be tight and heavily contested encouters, but with confidence rising, we are now in real danger of putting a real Cup and League run together or are my blue-tinted lenses already getting the better of me?