ENGLISH PREMIER LEAGUE Sunderland 1 Manchester City 1:ADAM JOHNSON loomed high on Steve Bruce's January shopping list, but once Roberto Mancini registered an interest in the then Middlesbrough winger, Sunderland's outbid manager had no option but to concede defeat.
That was what Mancini’s City were heading for on Wearside yesterday until Johnson, a late substitute, curled in a sublime stoppage-time equaliser to secure a potentially vital point in his side’s pursuit of fourth place.
“It’s going to be very tight but I think we have a good chance of qualifying for the Champions League,” said a previously agitated Mancini, his sanity possibly preserved by the Sunderland-born Johnson’s 11th-hour intervention.
Earlier City’s manager had pressed almost every conceivable tactical button, repeatedly reconfiguring his side as Bruce’s renascent team variously left him sighing, grimacing and even tugging at both his knotted blue and white scarf and coiffed hair.
Despite a recently concluded run of 14 league games without a win, Bruce’s job security was never in doubt but he will be sleeping a little easier after collecting four points from two games.
“We ran out of steam but the first half was the best we’d played for ages and we could quite easily have won,” said Sunderland’s manager, whose defence are prone to conceding late goals. “It’s ironic it had to be Adam Johnson who equalised.”
Along with several colleagues Kenwyne Jones appears to have belatedly stirred from a worrying midwinter hibernation and it took the Trinidad striker only nine minutes to register his eighth goal of the season.
David Meyler slipped a pass to Steed Malbranque and the left-sided midfielder’s ensuing cross was met by Jones, who outjumped Vincent Kompany before thumping a header past Shay Given.
As Jones, whose injury-induced half-time withdrawal arguably cost Sunderland victory, indulged in a series of cartwheels and backflips, Mancini fiddled anxiously with that hallmark scarf.
By the 32nd minute his side had conjured just one chance, a decent shooting opening spurned by Gareth Barry following a Micah Richards cross, and the Italian had seen enough.
Off went Wayne Bridge and on came Roque Santa Cruz with Pablo Zabaleta moving to left-back from the right of a central midfield trio as City switched from 4-3-2-1 to a much more menacing 4-4-2.
Yet Richards, particularly, still struggled to contain Malbranque, who has excelled since Bruce relocated him from the right to the left. Indeed the visiting right-back was fortunate to receive a yellow rather than a red card for an over-the-top tackle that might have broken Malbranque’s leg.
At this point almost every attacking move City mustered foundered in the face of both the outstanding central defender John Mensah and Anton Ferdinand’s impressive reinvention as a left-back.
Although Craig Gordon was overworked by the end of the afternoon, saving superbly from Bellamy (three times), and Santa Cruz, Sunderland’s goalkeeper did not make a significant stop until the 50th minute when he used his legs to repel Wright-Phillips’s close-range shot following Barry’s clever through-ball.
Shortly afterwards Barry found himself redeployed as City third’s left-back of the day when the introduction of first Patrick Vieira and then Johnson necessitated another round of positional musical chairs.
Finally Mancini had flicked the right switch and, after Sunderland only half-cleared Bellamy’s corner an imperious swipe of Johnson’s left foot sent the ball curving into the top corner.
Guardian Service
