MAN OH MAN! - Bleak Man City reality hits home as Delap fires Nottingham Forest to statement win

He gave it the full Cristiano Ronaldo celebration. And had every right to. No-one is ever going to confuse Liam Delap with the five-times Ballon d’Or winner but this was something special.

With around a quarter of the contest remaining, Nottingham Forest’s chances of holding on to a one-goal lead seemed slim to none. And slim was packing his bags. But Delap, a product of City, then started and finished a counter-attack with the bravado of a world-beater.

It was some moment. Left foot, bullet-quick, arrow-straight, postage-stamp territory, City Ground in glorious uproar as the mist really did roll in.

Delap’s sensational hit - his second of the match - gave Forest a thoroughly deserved win but this was another uninspiring City performance. Three Premier League defeats on the spin suggest a side waiting for their fate to be decided elsewhere.

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The initial reaction of the players to the independent commission’s guilty verdicts appeared to be one of defiance. It is hard not to think that defiance has dissipated somewhat.

Ex-professionals and pundits queue up to tell us the spectre of extreme sanctions will not affect the mentality of the squad but this is unprecedented. No-one really knows how it will impact their psyche. This is a group of footballers who strongly suspect whatever they produce on the pitch is likely to be rendered irrelevant by heavy punishment should the club’s appeal be unsuccessful. How can that not have the slightest impact?

Whether it is a factor or not, one thing was for sure based on much of the evidence from this match. City’s aggression has disappeared, City’s snap has gone, City’s desire has diminished.

They lost every even contest in the early stages. They were outmuscled. They showed no great appetite for a fight. First things first. Forest were outstanding in those early stages. Yes, Josko Gvardiol was culpable ahead of the opening goal but the determination and drive of scorer Jair Cunha was magnificent. And yes, another unacceptable surrender of possession preceded Forest’s second but Delap’s buccaneering run and finish was something to behold.

Oliver Glasner’s game-plan was brutally effective in its simplicity. Every time a City player had the ball in the opposition half, he was confronted by a ferociously committed Forest man.

They did not give the talented trio of Jeremy Doku, Rayan Cherki and Iliman Ndiaye a moment’s peace. And upfront, Delap comprehensively unsettled Marc Guehi and Ruben Dias.

Guehi’s form for City has been alarmingly poor - it was no shock he was hooked at half-time - and, of course, it does not help that Gianluigi Donnarumma is in one of those spells that is particularly unfortunate for a goalkeeper. Any decently-struck shot that comes his way goes past him. Not ideal.

They were very good hits from Cunha and Delap but Donnarumma’s efforts to keep them out looked to be little more than token.

Inevitably, City improved but Forest were relatively untroubled throughout the first half and Enzo Maresca inevitably made a couple of changes at the interval.

To begin with, they had minimal effect, though. Sloppiness ran through City’s ranks. They needed a moment of inspiration, an instance of genius. And it came from the left boot of Cherki, fizzing the sweetest of shots into the top corner. He does not deal in the mundane, Rayan.

With well over half an hour left on the clock, a full City comeback looked inevitable. But this was an evening when Forest dug fantastically deep, the example being set by captain Ryan Yates.

His work-rate set the standard but no-one was taking the man of the match honours away from Delap and Glasner afforded him the great ovation he deserved by substituting him late in proceedings.

It was just the performance Delap needed. For City, it was the performance of a team that knows the most costly defeats are likely to come off the pitch.