Matheus Nunes’ 94th-minute winner sent Pep Guardiola wild and Manchester City into third place after a dramatic 2-1 victory at home to Aston Villa on Tuesday night.

“We are ready,” Unai Emery declared ahead of kick off. City evidently weren’t. Marcus Rashford struck the base of the post 17 seconds after the opening whistle, leaving Ruben Dias with twisted blood and the entire home defence red faced.

That early scare acted as a wake-up call for the hosts, who found themselves in front in the seventh minute. Omar Marmoush peeled away from his central role in a particularly narrow iteration of Pep Guardiola’s side, skating past Matty Cash before prodding a cutback into the stride of Bernardo Silva. The midfield’s effort was directly at Emi Martinez, yet Villa’s skipper only managed to limply palm the ball onto his boot and into the net.

Denied by the upright in the opening seconds, Rashford got his goal in the 18th minute. Another jet-heeled surge by the razor-sharp Manchester United loanee, playing with an added sense of zip and fizz against his former rivals, created the opening for Jacob Ramsey to burst into the box, where he was clumsily felled by Dias. Rashford made no mistake from 12 yards.

Guardiola billed Tuesday’s head-to-head between two of the five sides vying for three Champions League qualification spots as “a final”. The Catalan treated it as such by deploying a completely unexpected tactical system. James McAtee lined up as part of a front-two together with Marmoush behind a box midfield devoid of wingers.

From that central position, McAtee lofted an audacious second-half effort over Martinez and narrowly past the post before scuffing an even clearer opening from inside the six-yard box.

What had begun as a wild-eyed ding-dong soon settled into a pattern of City probing punctuated by swift Villa breakaways. Emery’s visitors weren’t limited to moments of transition, confidently stroking the ball around their defensive third in the face of a heavy-footed high press.

After an opening 75 minutes which had seen few clear chances for either side, Guardiola added the maverick element of Jeremy Doku. The pure winger inserted into a game played almost entirely in the central slice of the pitch made the difference at the death, jinking past Axel Disasi before rolling a perfectly weighted ball across the box for Nunes to fire in a stoppage-time winner.

Victory took City up to third but leaves Villa down in seventh, two points adrift of the top five before Newcastle United play their game in hand this weekend.

Man City player ratings (4-2-2-2)

*Ratings provided by FotMob*

Subs not used: Scott Carson (GK), Abdukodir Khusanov, Rico Lewis, Nico Gonzalez, Jack Grealish, Phil Foden, Savinho.

Aston Villa player ratings (4-2-3-1)

*Ratings provided by FotMob*

Subs not used: Robin Olsen (GK), Andres Garcia, Ian Maatsen, Ross Barkley.

Player of the match – Bernardo Silva (Man City)

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