More sweat than swagger for Man City against Burnley

Burnley 1 Manchester City 2

Guardiola’s City are that modern cliche, a work in progress — he has, after all, been in Manchester only a matter of months — and for all the breathtaking football, of which there was little here, it is the big characters he inherited who are sustaining the challenge.

A week earlier it had been Yaya Toure, the African powerhouse brought in from the cold when sorry finally stopped being the hardest word, who rampaged through Crystal Palace’s defence to keep City snapping at the heels of their title rivals.