City faithful believe, even if Mancini has doubts

It took just 90 minutes — along with two goals from Sergio Aguero and a purposeful return to the starting line-up from Carlos Tevez — for Manchester City to re-ignite a Premier League title race that, as of last Sunday evening, looked to all intents and purposes to be over.

In truth, City’s effortless victory over a listless and disinterested West Brom was not the significant action of the evening. Rather, a few miles across Lancashire, it came at the DW Stadium where Manchester United’s surprising defeat to Wigan allowed City to cut the deficit at the top of the table to five points.

City supporters, who had appeared as unmotivated as the Albion players before kick-off and in the opening stages of the game, suddenly burst to life in the second half as news from Wigan filtered through and City helped themselves to three goals — improving their goal difference over United in the process — while instilling new belief in their fans.