English Premier League: What Went Wrong in Manchester City's Loss to Sunderland

Another interesting week of EPL football is behind us—this time with three of the Top 4 teams suffering shocking losses to weak opponents.  

Despite my rather arrogant article addressing pre-match predictions for a comfortable and entertaining match for City fans, this result was disastrous.

With a shocking injury-time defeat, Manchester City failed to advance three points from the top and create separation from Manchester United in the table.  

Let's examine what exactly happened in this devastating last-second loss to Sunderland yesterday.  

Inability to Score

Probably the most obvious and painful reason for both the draw last week and the loss today is Manchester City's sudden inability to score.

For a team loaded with talent from top to bottom, it seems surreal that they haven't found net in two full games.  

Edin Dzeko was particularly frustrating.  Having hit the woodwork in the first half, Dzeko shot often and wildly at times in an attempt to end his personal goal drought of eight appearances. 

City worked like bees outside of Sunderland's 18-yard box seemingly all game, but could not find the end of crosses or direct balls at goal.  

Wasteful Possession

When looking at the match stats, the results are preposterous.  With an astonishing 27 shots attempted, only five were on target.  Ten corner kicks were all wasted, and get ready for this: 69 percent possession of the ball was squandered in the end .  

On another day, this could have resulted in a very lopsided fixture, but not today.  This waste was extremely frustrating to watch and pitiful when you read down the roster.    

Possession is nice to have, but as Sunderland can now prove, it isn't everything and doesn't guarantee you victories. 

The Goal

With only two shots on target all game, 31 percent time of possession and just seconds remaining in stoppage time, Dong-Wong Ji became both a hero and a villain.  

In the the remaining few seconds of stoppage time, Sunderland countered with a purpose.  In one of the not-so-rare and highly-criticized moments, Ji revived the ball in a clear offside position behind the defenders.  Without a flag being raised, Ji maneuvered around a charging Joe Hart and sent the Sunderland faithful into a frenzy.  

This goal will certainly be a target of controversy and advocacy for video review on goals.  

Despite the controversy, City did not accomplish enough to earn three points in this game. 

Afterthoughts...

Despite the controversy surrounding the loss, City needs to regain its scoring touch in a hurry.  

Two wild weeks of bizarre results have kept this squad atop.  City is doing a lot of things right, but the goal drought is certainly putting pressure on their title chances.  

This needs to be resolved imminently if they have any hopes of keeping their title chances alive through January.