Missing in action during the past six torrid weeks: Manchester City’s pizzazz. It was absent here again, in the latest moping performance that has become the recognisable face of Pep Guardiola’s formerly supreme team.
There is now a surreal element about City’s plunge. Sides go on losing runs – sure they do – but for this champion group to lose for a seventh time in 10 games and extend their disturbing run to a meagre solitary victory in the sequence is baffling.
It is befuddling Guardiola, who acknowledged his men should have won more times than they have since first going down at Tottenham in the Carabao Cup on 30 October. The manager’s statement came before this latest reverse, perhaps aired as a gee-up.
It failed to work. Instead Juventus sealed a precious win thanks to Dusan Vlahovic’s 53rd-minute header and a second goal that came on the break when Timothy Weah flipped the ball in from the right and Weston McKennie thundered a volley home.
Each were substitutes thrown on by Thiago Motta. His opposite number, 75 minutes in, had deployed none: one more sign of the torpor engulfing Guardiola and his charges. So City sit in 22nd, a point above Paris Saint-Germain, whose 25th position does not qualify for the playoffs. Next stop for City in Europe is a trip to Paris next month.
At kick-off, City and Juve each had eight points so this was a clash of continental giants who needed victory and the boost it would provide on their return to domestic duties. Guardiola has exuded isolation, a loneliness that comes from serial losses and for the first time in nine years piloting City he cited injuries as mitigation, though he named a strong XI.
It featured Ilkay Gündogan as the holding midfielder and Kevin De Bruyne and Jack Grealish as twin playmakers. It had, too, Rico Lewis at left-back and his defensive fragility was exposed more than once, as when Francisco Conceição outmuscled him and Juve earned a corner.Too many mistakes is one Guardiola diagnosis of City’s ills. The Catalan demanded his charges play “simple”, then saw Lewis and Josko Gvardiol thump passes that missed Grealish near the Italian area.
Barcelona moved into second place in the Champions League table thanks to a thrilling 3-2 win over Borussia Dortmund.
Serhou Guirassy quickly cancelled out goals from Raphinha and Ferran Torres in the second half in Germany. But Torres struck again with five minutes left to secure Barça a fifth win from their six group games and leave them three points behind leaders Liverpool with two matches left. Dortmund's second defeat – their previous one coming away to Real Madrid leaves last season's runners-up a point outside the top eight.
Lille are among six teams all on 13 points, two behind Barca and one above Dortmund, after recovered from throwing away a two-goal lead to beat Sturm Graz 3-2 thanks to Hakon Arnar Haraldsson's 81st-minute winner.
Atlético Madrid extended their winning streak to 10 matches in all competitions by beating Slovan Bratislava 3-1 and boosting their hopes of avoiding a two-legged playoff to reach the last 16.
Julián Alvarez and Antoine Griezmann scored in the first half to put the Spanish side in control. David Strelec's penalty pulled one back for the Slovakian champions, but Griezmann quickly added his second as Diego Simeone's side recorded their fourth victory from six group games to sit level on points with Dortmund and Bayern Munich.
Milan moved on to 12 points after Tammy Abraham's 87th-minute winner earned a 2-1 victory over Red Star Belgrade.
Benfica were held to a 0-0 draw at home to Bologna, Feyenoord beat Sparta Prague 4-2 to move into a playoff place and Stuttgart thrashed bottom club Young Boys 5-1.
In the night's one Europa League match, Inaki Williams scored twice as Athletic Bilbao went top of the table with a 2-0 win at José Mourinho's Fenerbahce.
Gündogan and Kyle Walker did the same: each found Nicolo Savona rather than Jérémy Doku on the left. The second instance caused Guardiola to shake his head. When De Bruyne did locate his man, Erling Haaland’s clumsy touch had the ball ricocheting off his toes.
City prosper when they pounce, tiger-like, and they remembered this for a fleeting moment. Doku scampered infield, De Bruyne read his run, possession was delivered and a rapid cross caused Juve to fling bodies at the ball to clear.
Walker – oddly – seems to have been written off everywhere as suddenly geriatric and so slow he runs in reverse. If the right-back is an easy patsy for City’s ills – he is 34, and may have lost a fraction – the error that had Vlahovic bearing down on Ederson’s goal will have had those penning the career obituaries feeling vindicated.
The wider story for City was the same one that has become no surprise. They lacked effervescence and confidence: a quaint state for the Premier League champions of the past four seasons and which will seem even stranger when looking back via the distance of time.
Jump-leads are required to shock City back to what they have been and what Guardiola is sure they can be again.
De Bruyne created a moment that might have done the trick but Haaland fluffed his lines. A swivel-and-dragback was followed by a cute pass that wrongfooted Juve and put Haaland in. But he could not finish and Guardiola rocked on his heels in frustration, not for the first time.
His next act was the hands-above-the-head clap used for over-encouragement. It was apt following Walker blasting a short pass to De Bruyne straight out. Up went Guardiola’s arms and the flat pattern of City’s play continued.
Motta’s men were stuck in their own rut, unable to knit any sequence together, so City kindly aided them with their latest defensive farce. After Federico Gatti’s scissor-kick was repelled by Ederson, Gvardiol’s clearance missed Walker, ceding the ball to Manuel Locatelli. He crossed, Vlahovic headed, and although it was straight at the keeper, the ball bounced off his chest and squeezed into the bottom left corner despite a despairing dive.
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Juve were up to 14th. Grealish’s dancing feet slipped in Bernardo Silva but his shot was blocked. Rúben Dias had spoken of the team’s travails being a chance to show character, but Ederson, once more, spilled a cross and City were teetering.
Where was the carousel passing? The swagger and surety in front of goal? As in Guardiola’s first season, conviction was lacking. City went trophyless then. They may do again this season.
