Carlos Tevez scored a brilliant long-range strike to hand Manchester City a 1-0 victory over Swansea in the English Premier League.
In a game that saw a transformed City come out in the second half, after rather an abject first period, Tevez struck a sweet right-footer into the bottom corner just past the hour mark.
The win takes City to within one point of league leaders Chelsea, who play Manchester United at Stamford Bridge Sunday.
The first half was rather drab, with neither team really taking the initiative to break the deadlock. Swansea were the better of the two sides in the first 45, with their goalscoring Spaniard Michu on the end of a couple of the half's best chances -- a one-on-one with goalkeeper Joe Hart, particularly one that Michu would have wanted to put away, even if the England international did well to snuff out the opportunity.
City manager Roberto Mancini needed to make some changes at the start of the second half, after the home crowd at the Etihad had booed their team off the field at half-time. The Italian did just that, bringing on Mario Balotelli for Aleksandar Kolarov, and the change seemed to take an immediate effect.
Tevez and Samir Nasri, along with Yaya Toure, took control of the center of the park, and with it control of the game in the first 20 minutes of the second half.
Nasri created a couple of early chances - first his zippy cross just eluded the oncoming Balotelli, and then his through ball to the enigmatic Italian failed to register the required result after the striker's hesitation in front of goal and some fine and alert goalkeeping from Michel Vorm.
Swansea then had a glorious opportunity to open the scoring and send the Premier League champions into despair, but Michu failed to direct a close-range header into the back of the net, off a nice cross from the right - Hart making a comfortable save after the ball came straight at him.
Tevez came to the party in the 61st minute - driving home a perfectly struck shot past a diving Vorm, who injured his groin as a result and had to be taken off on a stretcher. City defender Micah Richards also picked up a knee injury later on, and like Vorm had to be stretchered off the field - as a result the referee added on a staggering 12 minutes at the end of the 90 minutes.
Michael Laudrup brought on striker Danny Graham in the 72nd minute to try and find the equalizer, and the Welsh side did look like they might find the all-important goal a couple of times, with Michu again coming close off a header.
However, despite the extended injury time, City held on, much to the relief of Mancini, and to a certain extent exorcised the ghosts of the woeful Ajax defeat, while also ensuring they kept up the pressure on Chelsea and United.
