abregas hails ‘outstanding’ win as Arsenal beat Man City
Skipper Cesc Fabregas praised an “outstanding” Arsenal performance after the gunners battled to a hard-fought victory over 10-man Manchester City at Eastlands.
Dedryck Boyata was sent off after just five minutes for bringing down Marouane Chamakh with the striker through on goal.
Samir Nasri opened the scoring for the visitors beforeFabregas’s first-half penalty was well saved by Joe Hart.
Alex Song then doubled his side’s lead mid-way through second half and substitute Nicklas Bendtner put the result beyond doubt to propel Arsene Wenger’s men into second place in the Premier League, five points behind leaders Chelsea.
“I think we played some outstanding football and it’s difficult to stop a side when they play at that tempo,” saidFabregas, who was instrumental throughout at the City of Manchester Stadium. “Even if they were 15 and we were 11 we would still go and win.
“We always want to go forward and create chances but the way we played today, we were very difficult to stop. I think we were fantastic.
“It’s very difficult what to know what will happen (over the rest of the season) and we have an important game on Wednesday (against Newcastle in the Carling Cup), but it’s a good victory against a good team.”
abregas added: “Chelsea are looking strong but they have to play a lot of the big teams. We have to keep calm and think about the Carling Cup and then we think about West Ham next Saturday and getting back into the league.”
Meanwhile, Wenger admitted he feared his side might not finish the match with 11 men following a flurry of first-half bookings.
“It is always difficult against 10 men but we have shown our intelligence, and we slowly took over the game,” said the Arsenal manager. “Sometimes we have played 11 against 10 and not won.
“We were on a few yellow cards so we had to calm down and play in a positive way in the second half.”
