Erling Haaland is the only Manchester City player to score more goals directly leading to points this season than John Stones after the defender left it late again against Wolverhampton Wanderers.
Five weeks on from firing in his 98th minute to draw with Arsenal, Stones headed home in the fifth minute of added-time at Molineux to take all three points back to Manchester. In doing so, they remain only one point behind Liverpool, who stayed at the top of the Premier League table after their win over Chelsea.
While that gap remains the same, City’s advantage over Mikel Arteta’s side has increased to three points. The ten-man Gunners’ loss to Bournemouth 2-0 enabled Pep Guardiola’s team to capitalise.
In a weekend of refereeing controversy, which started at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium at Saturday lunchtime and continued to Sunday evening’s game at Anfield, City did not escape unscathed. However, there is a consensus about their winning goal at Wolves as we round-up the latest headlines:
Referee verdict
The former Premier League referee Keith Hackett believes “it was the right call to award the goal” Stones scored despite the initial confusion about VAR’s involvement. “[Stuart] Attwell was right to give Kavanagh the opportunity to assess his opinion,” the retired official has said in The Telegraph.
“I believe Silva used a degree of intelligence rather than skulduggery in the build-up.” Hackett continued: “Did that action on Wolves keeper Jose Sa prior to the Manchester City corner kick prevent the goalkeeper from making a save? I am not so sure that was even looked at by the referee when reviewing the pitchside monitor.
“When Stones headed the ball towards goal, [Bernardo] Silva had moved seconds earlier, and the goalkeeper was now left with a clear line of sight and no visible interference, resulting in referee Kavanagh overturning his original decision and awarding the goal.”
Meeting update
The former Man City financial adviser Stefan Borson believes that last week’s postponed Premier League meeting will only happen once the arbitration tribunal clarifies the next steps regarding associated party transactions (APT) rules. City and the Premier League hold different views about whether the decision means these are now null and void.
“I think there is quite a lot of significance in the meeting being postponed,” Borson told Football Insider. “I think it’s really just a case of the parties not being in agreement and thinking there’s no point in having a meeting until they have clarification from the tribunal.”
