A game that could have made you gone to sleep with its lack of action for the larger part of its first half was decided by a controversial penalty as Manchester City saw off the test of Wolves 1-0 at the Etihad.
Raheem Sterling converted from the spot after the interval to score his 100th Premier League goal and a decisive one that won the game for his team.
Following the shuffle against RB Leipzig, Pep Guardiola reshuffled his team again, with only three players from the midweek game, Ilkay Gundogan, Jack Grealish and Oleksandr Zincheko retaining their places. Ederson Moraes was also back in goal after Zack Steffen had a time out in the loss in midweek.
There was no much movement in the Wolves team and Bruno Lage only dropped Hwang Hee-Chan for Ruben Neves as the only change to his side that lost narrowly to Liverpool last weekend.
The first half was lacking of action for most part of it. Manchester City expectedly dominated possession, but were unable to open up a stubborn Wolves side, who were looking to avoid their fourth consecutive loss in the league.
The highlight of the first half happened towards the end when Raul Jimenez was shown his matching orders. The Mexican had dragged down Rodri Hernandez, which got him a yellow card. From the resulting free-kick that was taken by City, he refused to step back and block the restart, leaving referee Jon Moss with no other option than to show him his second yellow of the afternoon.
With one man down, there was only one way the game would go as Wolves played the better part of the remainder of the game in their own half soaking up pressure from the hosts, who looked to make their numerical advantage count.
City could only make the numerical advantage count in terms of possession with no goal to show for it. Conor Coady made two brilliant saves to deny Aymeric Laporte and Ilkay Gundogan, in between two half chances missed by Gabriel Jesus and Joao Cancelo.
The biggest talking point of the game came three minutes after the hour mark when the hosts were awarded a penalty. Bernando Silva had made his run on the right side and whipped in a cross that looked to have hit Joao Moutinho in his armpit an onto his hand, leaving him with little time to react. Referee Jon Moss gave the penalty and VAR affirmed in what was a harsh decision.
Raheem Sterling stepped up to convert what would be the only goal of the game, one that took him to 100 Premier League goals, becoming the 25th player in the competition's history to hit the century and the 8th youngest.
The pressure from the hosts continued to increase from then and Grealish had two opportunities to have won the game for City. His first effort from a Sterling cross went well over the bar as he looked to have been put off by Gabriel in front of him, before trying a backheel that was blocked by the Wolves defence.
Jesus and Foden were denied by Jose Sa as Wolves hung on while trying to earn a point. The final chance in additional minutes fell to Max Kilman, when he met a cross from Moutinho with a header at the far post, but his effort was acrobatically denied by Ederson.
Concluding Thoughts
It's the sixth consecutive victory for City as they remain atop the league looking to defend their title. They showed champions stuff as they were able to grind out results even on a day that wasn't so good.
More problems from Bruno Lage as his team have now failed to win in four games, neither have they managed one goal in all.
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