Manchester City 0 Dynamo Kiev 0 (Agg 3-1)
For a team moving into their first Champions League quarter-finals there was a distinct lack of jubilation inside Manchester City’s stadium. Their work had been done in the Olimpiyskiy three weeks earlier and the lingering image of this night will be the passage of play early on that finished with Vincent Kompany limping off and an unhappy piece of deja vu that threatens to have serious repercussions for the remainder of their season.
Otherwise it was a stress-free night for City, protecting a 3-1 lead from the first leg in Kiev and facing a plodding, unadventurous side who seemed unaware that their opponents can be susceptible against teams who attack with pace and movement. A better gauge of Manuel Pellegrini’s team will surely come if they are drawn against one of the tournament favourites because they certainly got lucky being paired against a side of Dynamo’s limitations.
In the meantime City must await the latest prognosis on Kompany’s fitness and what will plainly be another lengthy spell of rehabilitation. His injuries have become such a recurring theme it is probably understandable if the crowd went home reflecting on a bittersweet occasion and, without wishing to be melodramatic, there have to be serious concerns about whether he will ever get out of this demoralising cycle.
Perhaps an argument could be made that Pellegrini has asked too much of his captain recently and did not have to risk him in a match when City had such a commanding first-leg lead. Yet the bottom line is that Kompany, approaching his 30th birthday, is too susceptible to these injuries and City’s supporters have become wearily accustomed to those moments, as happened here after only five minutes, when he stretches for the ball, feels the tell-tale pain, then his hand goes up and his expression darkens.
If the scans confirm a damaged calf muscle, it will be the 14th injury of this nature since he joined the club in 2008. In three separate spells this season he has missed four and a half months, including two seven-week lay-offs when he managed only nine minutes in between before the same problem flared up again. When a man is this fragile, it is difficult to imagine his return will be a quick one – or that he will be able to play a significant part in City’s remaining games.
As if that were not galling enough for City, with the small matter of a Manchester derby on Sunday, Nicolas Otamendi lasted only until the midway point of the first half before it became obvious he, too, could not continue. In little over a quarter of an hour City had lost both their centre-halves and, with Eliaquim Mangala and Martin Demichelis on the pitch, they were fortunate their opponents did not seem to understand that, if they started to attack with more adventure, they might get some joy. Kompany has had accident-prone spells and Otamendi’s flaws have been conspicuous far too often this season but the presence of Mangala and Demichelis gives City’s defence an air of vulnerability. If these two are given an extended run in the team, City’s opponents will always feel it is possible to create chances.
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That knowledge might help to explain why it was a strange mood inside the stadium. At one point Yaya Touré became embroiled in a heated row with his own goalkeeper, Joe Hart, apparently because of a misdirected goal-kick. City’s commercial staff had branded it “Breakthrough Night” but there were still large expanses of unfilled seats and, by half-time, some clear signs that many supporters are growing weary of Jesús Navas’s inability to have a greater influence. When one attack broke down because Navas had overhit a simple pass to the overlapping Sergio Agüero there was an exasperated response from the crowd.
Dynamo were moderate opponents but, apart from some driving runs from Touré , City seemed caught in two minds during the opening half about whether they should protect their lead or go for the goal that would effectively settle the tie. It is a common problem for teams who have won the away leg and it was unusual to see City creating so little.
David Silva contributed one of the outstanding moments with a little turn and drag-back to take out two opponents but the Spaniard was strangely subdued for long periods. The same applied to Agüero and it is understandable if the crowd want more from Navas even if, to give him his due, he provided one moment of passing excitement by cracking an angled shot against a post.
An hour had passed at that stage and Hart, for the most part, had been untroubled. Andriy Yarmolenko aimed one shot straight into the goalkeeper’s arms but it was a tepid attempt by the Ukrainian side to save themselves from the damage that had been inflicted on their own ground. Sergei Rebrov’s team had plenty of the ball but there was never a single point of the night when they seriously threatened a feat of escapology.
There has been only one occasion in the history of the European Cup when a team has lost 3-1 at home in the first leg and gone through. That was Ajax in 1969, at the expense of Benfica, but that side had Johan Cruyff driving them forward. Dynamo were a different proposition altogether and City will know there are tougher assignments to come.
