How to End a Bad Week, by Manchester City Football Club.

How to End a Bad Week, by Manchester City Football Club.

That was excellent. As I said in the matchday thread on Bluemoon-mcfc.co.uk, we have the players that can produce the goods and break down defences that try to stifle us. Samir Nasri showed once again why we paid so much for him, David Silva showed why he won the Barclays Player of the Month Award for September 2011 and Super Mario is beginning to show why Roberto Mancini and Manchester City have persisted with him for so long.

In the bright Lancashire sunshine, City took a while to get going - Mario Balotelli's shooting was a little off and Sergio Aguero was walked off the field rather uncomfortably with a groin strain - and things just weren't going well. The build up play was patient and controlling but City were blocked off well by a superb Blackburn defence. Only once did City break through the cracks, but Balo's shot hit the wrong side of the netting.

But as it did last week, our persistence paid off! A corner was cleared to Adam Johnson who, despite having a poor game by his standards, curled a shot beautifully into the top corner from the edge of the area, akin to his late injury-time equaliser against Sunderland nearly two years ago. And then the floodgates opened

Mario Balotelli flew like a graceful bird at the front post to tap in the second goal, finally showing to Mancini that he's knuckling down. Samir Nasri scored his first ever goal for Manchester City via two deflections and Stefan Savic rose like a phoenix to plant a bullet header past Paul Robinson to make it 4-0. What a day.

Every substitute was made successfully without a refusal, Mario smiled and the City fans were in full voice throughout. Their vocal support of Mancini really came across well on the awful coverage I managed to find. The only problem is Aguero's injury, but that's nothing some good rest over the international break won't fix.

Ratings:Hart 7; Zabaleta 7, Kompany 7, Lescott 7, Kolarov 6; Yaya Toure 9, Milner 8, Silva 8, Johnson 6; Balotelli 9, Aguero 5.

Savic 7; Nasri 8; Dzeko (N/A)