What Wolves did in the build-up to Man City clash to help them secure shock win

Manchester City fell to their first Premier League defeat of the season at Molineux

Wolves manager Gary O’Neil has reflected on a week of detailed analysis that paid off with a 2-1 win at home to Manchester City on Saturday.

City suffered their second defeat in just five days across all competitions after twice falling behind at Molineux. An own goal from Ruben Dias put the home side ahead inside 13 minutes but Julian Alvarez equalised with a brilliant free-kick early in the second half.

Pep Guardiola’s side looked set to push for a winner after that but were dealt a huge blow when Hwang Hee-chan netted what would turn out to be the winner. The South Korean slammed into an empty net after some calamitous defending from Nathan AkeCity continued to press for a second equaliser but were met by a defiant Wolves side. And speaking after the win, O’Neil insisted his team had worked hard all week to nullify their threat.

[I am] pleased, of course,” O’Neil told BBC Sport. “The season’s not started well for us. [It has] been a tough start. The lads have stayed committed in every game and gave everything. The game looked exactly as we prepped.

“I’m not out here making big statements. I am just trying to win a game of football. [We have] Aston Villa next week and they won 6-1 today. If the prep can go as well as it did and the lads stick to the plan we can cause them some problems.

“We needed to find a way to be solid and have enough attacking players to carry us up the pitch. We prepped for the game really well. The lads saw all the [patterns] that we looked at and they carried it out brilliantly.”

Wolves had won just one of their opening six Premier League games in the build-up to Saturday’s clash, with few expecting them to take anything from the treble-winners. City had won every game in the league up until this weekend and were strong favourites to take all three points.

“Beating the best team in the world, and possibly ever, is a massive result for us,” O’Neil added. “It is a big result. Beating Manchester City with where they are and off where we were and what people were saying about it. To answer it with that, was pretty pleasing.”