Match Report & Player Ratings: Manchester City 2-2 Nottingham Forest (Premier League) | OneFootball

Manchester City’s fight in the Premier League title race may not be over, but a hugely damaging draw to 17th-placed Nottingham Forest effectively handed Arsenal the title with Pep Guardiola’s now seven points behind the Gunners with nine games to go. 

On the night, Arsenal had come out winners against Brighton & Hove Albion and City simultaneously needed a victory to keep up the chase, which they were well on their way to doing when Antoine Semenyo opened the scoring inside 31 minutes. 

But even after Rodri provided a second-half lead following Morgan Gibbs-White’s equaliser on 56 minutes, Elliot Anderson dealt a disappointing blow to the Citizens with a wonderful effort from 24 yards out. 

What followed were late efforts from City, where Anderson nearly gave away a penalty after 93 minutes before Semenyo forced Matz Sels into a heroic save with less than a minute remaining. The action continued until the very last kick of the game, where Murillo denied Savinho off the line to share the points.

Guardiola’s pre-match injury concerns were at least half-resolved as Erling Haaland, who was absent in the visit to Elland Road on Saturday, returned to the line-up, though Nico O’Reilly was ruled out after coming off in that game after 70 minutes with an ankle problem.

Still, Haaland’s presence was a huge boost for the home side who, against Leeds United, showed a rather large over-reliance on Antoine Semenyo, who scored the only goal in that narrow victory last weekend before opening the scoring here. 

Surprisingly, it was Vitor Pereira’s men who got off to a more lively start however when Elliot Anderson – the £100 million midfielder who has frequently drawn interest from Guardiola – and Gibbs-White had efforts blocked and saved respectively inside the opening two minutes.

And it wasn’t until the seventh minute until City really got kicking, particularly when Semenyo unleashed a devastatingly powerful hit with his left that clattered into the side netting of Matz Sels’ net. 

When the ball kicked up just under 12 minutes later, Haaland picked it out of the air and it eventually fell into the feet of Bernardo Silva, whose first strike was saved by Sels before Nikola Milenkovic proved brave enough to throw his head in front of another from just outside the box. 

The first blow for Forest came when the game was 31 minutes old, with Semenyo getting on the end of an inviting cross from Rayan Cherki, who scored the winner in the reverse fixture in December. Semenyo, now on seven goals for the season, finished well with his first touch from 10 yards. 

Following the opener, the most promising chance to extend the lead came a matter of seconds before the interval when Semenyo pierced the six-yard box with a low pass across the face of goal; Ruben Dias and Haaland both committed but came up too short with only the slightest of touches needed for a second.

Earlier, a tussle between Haaland and Milenkovic preceded a glaring chance for Gibbs-White where, after receiving the ball from Nicolas Dominguez on the left side of the box, he dispatched his attempt with too much delicacy and too little strength. 

But it was the Forest talisman’s next touch that would ignite the corner of the Etihad, after back-heeling Igor Jesus’ headed pull-back through Rodri’s legs and into the bottom corner of Gianluigi Donnarumma’s goal to equalise. 

Of course, following Rodri’s equaliser it was City’s game to win and the advantage could have been extended through a penalty when Haaland was taken down by Sels inside the area but a VAR check deemed the on-field decision of no foul as correct. 

And in time that eventually came back to bite City when Gibbs-White fizzed a pass across the pitch to Anderson before the England international exchanged passes with Callum Hudson-Odoi from 24 yards. An unforgivable strike followed that glided into the far corner past Donnarumma. 

Here’s how we rated the Manchester City players from their draw against Nottingham Forest at the Etihad Stadium. 

Player Ratings

Starting XI

Gianluigi Donnarumma – 6

Made a strong stop towards the end of the first half and did a good job in stopping even the tamest of efforts from the first half before disaster struck. Needs to do better with both goals. 

Matheus Nunes – 5.5

Started, like every Manchester City player, adequately but dropped in performance until the last minute. Should have been stronger down the right but no individual performance was horrible. 

Ruben Dias – 5.5

Led the line with Marc Guehi well once again but a strong structure was thrown out of the window for their first. The second was down to great skill from Elliot Anderson, which couldn’t really have been prevented from a centre-back standpoint. 

Marc Guehi – 6

A good performance once again all things considered. He was the deepest player for the majority but struggled to contain Nottingham Forest’s counter-attacking ability. Needs to be more urgent on strikes like Elliot Anderson’s. 

Rayan Ait-Nouri – 5.5

A lot of the football was played down the right of the pitch which gave Rayan Ait-Nouri less to do, though he would often drift inside and play in a more central role when City were in possession. Not amazing but certainly didn’t do tons wrong.

Rodri – 7

Navigated transitions from deep and pushed up when it was needed to pin Nottingham Forest back. Dictated play and worked in unison with Marc Guehi and Ruben Dias at the back, playing calm yet effective passes from all areas of the pitch. 

Phil Foden – 5

Impacted the game and looked free in the middle. Hasn’t impressed in many games this season but was clearly enjoying himself out there early on Wednesday. Him and Rayan Cherki inside looked a remarkable partnership in the first half but his creation wasn’t there. 

Bernardo Silva – 6

Seemed to be shooting more here than in previous games which was refreshing to see. And some troubling strikes for the Nottingham Forest defence and goalkeeper, particularly in the 49th minute when dribbling around Elliot Anderson and Neco Williams.

Rayan Cherki – 7

Moved well in and around the Nottingham Forest midfield and defence, and caused a lot of problems in the 82 minutes that he played. Admittedly, he could have created more but that comes with the help of his teammates, all of which underperformed here. 

Erling Haaland – 5

An exciting return but one that really didn’t bring much. His ‘new’ roaming role under Pep Guardiola is helpful on set-pieces but has hit his offensive game quite hard granted he is at an all-time scoring low from his years at Manchester City so far. 

Antoine Semenyo – 7

Are there any words to sum up Antoine Semenyo at the moment? Another game and another goal for the attacker, who appeared to be just as crucial here as he was against Leeds United last weekend. A great individual performance that was hurt by dropped points. 

Substitutes

Jeremy Doku – 5

Lost the ball horribly before showing the determination to win the ball back in the last moments, but did little else to motivate a winner.  

Abdukodir Khusanov – 5

Was strong after coming on, but wasn’t really tested given Manchester City’s onslaught resumed for a winner very late on. 

Savinho – 5

Came on after 82 minutes, nearly scored the winner with the last kick of the game but was denied by Murillo unfortunately.