Best performance by a visiting team

[dennishasdoneit]

West Ham (on Saturday 21 March 1970) beat a very good City team 5-1 at Maine Road. The City team had won the League Championship, the FA Cup and the League Cup in less than two years and were on their way to winning the European Cup Winners Cup. However, they were ripped apart by an excellent West Ham side including Jimmy Greaves on his debut.

West Ham played well enough but they definitely had a couple of things going for them - the Wednesday previous we'd gone to extra time on a typical Maine Rd mud heap to beat Academica in the Cup Winners Cup QF, also Bell and Summerbee were missing for the West Ham match, we looked knackered.

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Id agree that it could hardly be said WHU beat a very good City team if Bell and Summerbee werent playing....

In the reverse fixture December 1969,earlier that season, Manchester City completely destroyed Westham 4 nil at Upton Park on a ice rink of a pitch.Bell and Summerbee both played that day..its right to say that the hammers played fairly well in this match too,having plenty of shots on goals and were unlucky at times,but the u tube vid shows the immense class of the City team at that time.Bell was magnificent. Westham were worried about his influence and had given world cup winning captain Bobby Moore the job of marking him...that didnt go too well..Bell pulled him all over the pitch and at one stage makes a complete mug of moore by tapping the ball forward as moore comes rushing in,then jinking the other way,around Moore to collect it,leaving the england centre back tackling fresh air....A brilliant bit of skill,which Brian Moore,the commentator, who had been full of himself all game,with all sorts of superlatives...completely ignored.When WHU turned up at Maine Road 3 months later they clearly had revenge on their mind,and the absence of Bell and Buzzer played into their hands. But when both teams had their best players playing....City smashed Westham to bits.

 

[vmsuhail]

From the last 8 years:
1. Klopp's Dortmund
2. Pep's Bayern
3. Klopp's Liverpool against Pellegrini's side (1-4)

 

[Man_City_Loyal]

That 4-0 plus the 5-1 a few years later

5-1 trumps it for me.

4-0 up in 20 mins. Nobody’s leaving early. Henry is applauded off the pitch by all sides of the ground. Still have nightmares of what Richard dunne did that day.

When we scored we all went mental like we’d just beaten them

 

[dublinblue12]

Given there might not be a lot of football to watch soon I thought a bit of reminiscing would be in order.

One question I’ve not seen asked recently is which have been the most impressive performances you’ve seen by a visiting team at Maine Rd or the Etihad?

Apologies if praising other teams seems a bit heretical but it’s only a game after all.

Two stick out for me:
1. April 82 at Maine Rd. We got absolutely smashed by the Liverpool side with Hansen, Dalglish and Rush in it. They won 5-0 but could have been many more. Ronnie Whelan was outstanding for them.

2. October 13 at the Etihad. Pep’s Bayern beat us 3-1. We had some self inflicted wounds that night but the way the Bayern team passed and moved that night was like watching pros play amateurs. Philip Lahm did his central midfield thing and we just couldn’t get near them, especially the first half.

Both those games had such a sense of opposition dominance that I think is the same as we’ve created for other teams on our travels for the past few years - so hopefully on some other far away fan forum someone’s writing about that amazing City performance.

Remember watching that Bayern match and dreaming of us one day playing that kind of football :)

 

[The Light Was Yellow Sir]

5-1 trumps it for me.

4-0 up in 20 mins. Nobody’s leaving early. Henry is applauded off the pitch by all sides of the ground. Still have nightmares of what Richard dunne did that day.

When we scored we all went mental like we’d just beaten them

I agree with all that. I do have an odd recollection (and it might just be me) but I think their reserve keeper (Taylor?) had an absolute blinder in the second half. That being said, if we’d got a couple I got the feeling they’d have just gone up the other end and it would have finished 3-7! I also remember Henry get a huge round of applause when taking a corner!

 

[Citizen Green]

In my time:

Arsenal 2002-03: 4-0 up after 19 minutes @ Maine Road, pace, power and ruthlessness.
Spurs 2007-08: League Cup QF @ CoMS, the performance of Berbatov that night is arguably the best individual performance I've seen against a City side, he was immense, raised the levels of all his teammates around him.
Dortmund 2012-13: CL group stage @ the Etihad, intensity and aggression, left us no space to play and were incrdible in transition to attack, Joe Hart alone stopped it from being 4/5-0. How we ended up drawing that game I will never know. Klopp's football at it's best

 

[Man_City_Loyal]

I agree with all that. I do have an odd recollection (and it might just be me) but I think their reserve keeper (Taylor?) had an absolute blinder in the second half. That being said, if we’d got a couple I got the feeling they’d have just gone up the other end and it would have finished 3-7! I also remember Henry get a huge round of applause when taking a corner!

Viera did as well, went for my birthday and took my arsenal supporting brother with me. hated him since

 

[@BluePhil8]

The European teams have always been better than ANY English side we have faced.

Napoli and Dortmund were both class at our place.

Bayern under Pep.

We've played Barcelona a few times and it's been men vs boys.

 

[DontLookBackInAnger]

I'll give you one of the best performances from a visiting player - Berbatov ripped us a new arsehole while playing for spuds in (I think) a cup game several years back. I remember they wore yellow and I remember the **** was magnificent that night.

Yes that was an amazing performance, I think because we dropped off second half of the season, but up until Christmas that year we had been one of the top 3 or 4 teams in the country and I might be wrong but I think Spurs had been really struggling and had only recently fired their manager

 

[Mike N]

Attended the Bayern game with a family friend. What a terrible lesson we were given that night!