Saints lead Man City

Southampton 2, Man City 0 (half-time)

Brett Ormerod hit a glorious double to add to his Worthington Cup hat-trick in midweek to put the skids under Manchester City at St Mary’s.

Ormerod’s first goal came after only 45 seconds of this Barclaycard Premiership contest, a perfect header from a Wayne Bridge cross.

And - after Peter Schmeichel made a string of saves to keep City alive - the former Blackpool striker rammed home at the second attempt to complete a brilliant breakaway raid, again instigated by Bridge.

Little had been seen of City’s French star Nicolas Anelka at this stage as his side came under the cosh but he suddenly burst into life on 32 minutes, cleverly knocking down Benarbia’s pass for Wright-Phillips to strike, but straight at Antti Niemi.

Then Anelka teased both Jason Dodd and Anders Svensson on the City left before cutting inside to shoot low into the side-netting.

This was more like it for City and Benarbia forced a corner with some trickery on the right. He took it himself and the ball was only half cleared in the air to Wright-Phillips, who struck a firm half-volley just wide from the edge of the area.

Just when City were getting their act together, though, centre-back Steve Howey had to come off injured in the 37th minute with Cameroon signing Lucien Mettomo going on in defence.

Mettomo was soon in the wars himself, crashing down after heading another Benarbia corner wide of the mark - but he was able to carry on after treatment.

But with three minutes to go before the break, City were hit by a hammer blow with Ormerod’s second goal.

The striker chased a long clearance down the middle from Bridge, got ahead of Mettomo and Distin and appeared to have lost his chance with a poor first touch that knocked the ball against the advancing Schmeichel.

The rebound favoured Ormerod, though, and he poked it high into the net.

City’s anguish was doubled when Jensen was booked for a foul just seconds after the restart.