Manchester City was blown away in a 2-0 loss to Stoke at a wind-swept Britannia Stadium on Saturday, with Marko Arnautovic scoring a first-half double against the outclassed Premier league leaders.
Austria forward Arnautovic scored in the seventh and 15th minutes from assists by Xherdan Shaqiri as Stoke exploited poor defending by City, which was without Sergio Aguero, Yaya Toure and Vincent Kompany because of injury.
It was City’s third loss in its last five games in all competitions — and fourth of its league campaign — to fuel concerns about the team’s shortcomings when its star players are missing.
Shaqiri shrugged off Fernandinho, beat left back Aleksandar Kolarov and sent in a cross that Arnautovic met with a half-volley for the opener. Shaqiri then turned holding midfielder Fernando and delivered a perfect through-ball that Arnautovic ran onto and slipped a low finish past Joe Hart to make it 2-0.
Goalless United jeered off
MANCHESTER: Manchester United’s attacking shortcomings were exposed again in a 0-0 draw against West Ham, with the team jeered off at Old Trafford after the fifth goalless stalemate in its last nine games.
A flurry of late chances didn’t disguise the problems United has up front under manager louis van Gaal, who was missing captain Wayne Rooney to compound his shortage of strikers.
Meanwhile, Olivier Giroud made up for an earlier own goal by scoring in the second half to help give Arsenal a 3-1 win over Sunderland.
Aaron Ramsey and Joel Campbell scored the other goals.