Brian Brobbey cements Barclaysman status but are Man City just too fun to win the title? | OneFootball

That was tremendously good fun from Manchester City.

But we do worry that if anything, for me, Clive, it was almost too much fun. We’re not having a go at a team that’s just gone three points clear at the top of the Premier League with a flawless record, but the most fun team just so rarely actually prevails. Their main rivals are Arsenal, for crying out loud. The opposite of fun.

This freewheeling, chaotic 5-3 win over Sunderland had all the hallmarks of yer classic ‘why they could win it, but also why they won’t’ kind of performance.

City’s attacking football was, at times, unstoppable. Erling Haaland missed an open goal long before he finally managed to tick off the 25th team he’s played against and now scored against in the Premier League. Nico O’Reilly missed a one-on-one with his first contribution off the bench.

But the chaos was not limited to one end of the pitch. Sunderland gave as good as they got and found a City defence in almost as welcoming mood as their own. In the first half they twice fell behind and twice responded with in minutes by producing a high-class equaliser after carving City wide open.

Both goals were scored by Brian Brobbey who went on to complete his hat-trick in the second half, again with a quick response to a City goal. Alas, by this point it was only a deficit reducer rather than equaliser.

But it was a goal that kept the game alive, and Sunderland had their moments at 4-3. City also had their moments at 4-3. And not in a good way, with Ruben Dias forced into an acrobatic goalline clearance from his own heavy touch after Gianluigi Donnarumma had gone walkabout. At no point did the big Italian inspire much confidence.

Haaland’s statistically significant goal settled nerves and took him alongside Harry Kane in the ‘scored against every Premier League club he’s played against’ club. As long as you have entry requirements of ‘played against more than one Premier League club’. Which you definitely should.

Ultimately, though, this felt like a game simply to be enjoyed for the spectacular pre-interlull spectacle that it was. Not everything has to mean everything. Some games are just a bunch of stuff that happened. And there was oh so much stuff.

A brilliantly cheeky bit of none-more Enzo Fernandez opportunism to open the scoring from a free-kick. Two superb Antoine Semenyo finishes to get his season up and running after a slightly sticky start. Rayan Cherki, who is simply always good value.

Erling Haaland having a goal disallowed for offside but overturned by VAR. Not going to be talking about this one for days on end, mind. We enjoyed it taking far longer than it needed to make a straightforward decision, such was the fear of banterpocalypse if there was anything iffy at all.

But above all there was Brobbey. He’s been a brilliant addition to the Premier League, one part elite striker, three parts elite sh*thouse and one part funny name. It’s a spectacular package, and this surely his best performance yet. His first goal was genuinely brilliant, a gossamer first touch to bring Enzo Le Fee’s precise pass under his spell before a deft finish beyond Donnarumma.

Then a poacher’s instinct for the second and third goals. Easy to be sniffy, but it’s a dying art in a Premier League now so short of Traditional Number Nines.

He becomes only the fifth player ever and first in 19 years to score a Premier League hat-trick in a losing cause, the first Sunderland player in a decade to score one in any Premier League cause, and the first to score one in Our League against City in a week shy of six years.

For all your pub quiz needs: Dwight Yorke, Dion Dublin, Roque Santa Cruz, Matt Le Tissier (only player to do it twice – makes you think). Jermain Defoe. Jamie Vardy.

That’s a sensational set of Barclaysmen, and Brobbey is without doubt a beyond worthy addition to that status.

Not a bad effort in defeat to overshadow the league’s greatest striker even as he’s setting his own latest nonsense landmark.