Manchester City 1-0 Brighton and Hove Albion: Foden continues his unbeaten run

To give Manchester City a win over Brighton and Hove Albion, Phil Foden netted his eighth goal of the season in all competitions.

After Phil Foden’s first-half goal secured a comfortable 1-0 win over Brighton and Hove Albion, Manchester City continued their unbeaten Premier League streak.

A minute before half-time, Foden found the back of the net and that proved to be enough for Pep Guardiola.

Bernardo Silva hit the crossbar and as a replacement, Gabriel Jesus made his return from COVID-19, but City could not add to their tally, with an injury time penalty missing from Raheem Sterling.

In the 14th minute, a lovely exchange between Kevin De Bruyne and Ilkay Gundogan led to the first major opening, but Robert Sanchez inside the six-yard box held the Belgian international out.

At the end of an elaborate move around the visitor’s box, Mahrez was unable to provide the finish, until De Bruyne was again denied by Sanchez following a counter-attack from the first corner of Brighton.

City made the turnaround on the stroke of half-time, with Foden exquisitely handling a pass from De Bruyne and directing a fine finish from the edge of the box into the bottom-left corner.

In the second half, Guardiola’s men stayed comfortably on top and after Mahrez missed a one-on-one, Sanchez denied Gundogan and saw Silva’s follow-up, which came after he sent the ball through the legs of Ben White, crashing back from the bar.

After De Bruyne pounced on a wayward header from Lewis Dunk and was brought down by Sanchez, substitute Sterling blazed his last-gasp penalty over.

But City had done enough with a game in hand to climb up to third and four points behind the Manchester United champions.