It's a great result for Andre Villas Boas, particularly coming off the back of a pair of 3-0 wins. First at Newcastle and then in the Champs League against Valencia to see them through as group winners; a make or break spell that although it has not won anything, you feel would be hard to come back from for the young manager if the results had not gone so well.
City remain top despite the loss, and for me remain the team to beat. They have such quality throughout their team and to be honest the level of celebration from Chelsea fans at the end spoke volumes, telling it's own tale about just where the power lies nowadays.
Similar premature and Neejurk style doom-mongery has been heard over on these shores of late, with the Brisbane Roar's 36 game unbeaten run coming to a crashing halt. First they were well beaten by an excellent all-round performance from Sydney FC, and then this weekend, even more incredibly, they were turned over at home by none other than Melbourne Heart. They, as City, remain top, and they, as City, remain the team to beat. The most remarkable thing arguably in this record breaking run that spanned over a year coming to an end, is the ridiculously fickle nature of the Roar fans.
2-0 down at half time, at home, and they booed. Seriously cobbers, are you having a flamin' laugh - or has the Castlemaine XXXX been served extra strong today? How fans think they can boo after a period of such dominance, where they have been treated to comfortably the best domestic football Australians have ever seen is beyond me. What great loyalty. Bloody idiots.
I fully expect both the Roar and Man City to get back on track and prove that their latest results are no more than what is to be expected from time to time. Indeed, if City had not made such a phenomenal start, and if the benchmark from Premier League excellence had not been set to a standard whereby every defat is a disaster, an away game at Chelsea would be one of the fixtures that Mancini would have marked down as 'be chuffed with a point'.
The one league topping team that I do not hold out quite so much hope for, sadly, is my own Southampton. Playing live on television last weekend at home to Blackpool, I had a bad feeling for a while before the game. Shoddy away results, a home record that was quite sensational but surely had to end, and a lifetime of being shit on TV all seemed to be pointing towards bad times.
The fact that regular keeper Kelvin Davis was out only added to my fears, and with Bartosz Bialkowski deputising in goal I knew things weren't going to go well (actual pre match conversation... my mate "is he decent" me "well he's always got one shocker in him per game")
If you've not seen what happened, two words: Massimo Taibi. Ironically Taibi's moment of infamy was against the Saints, maybe Bart was paying some kind of suicidal homage. Rickie Lambert rescued a point in injury time, and fortunately with West Ham showing poor reading skills, Southampton stay top, for now. I think this will not be the case for too much longer though, our away form will need to improve dramatically to sustain a title challenge.
Next game should be easy enough though, Portsmouth, at Fratton Park, on telly. Gulp.
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