Monday's Bolton reax

Chris Wheeler, Daily Mail

Carlos Tevez was simply magnificent, following up his match-winning performance against Chelsea with two goals either side of a superb move finished off by Micah Richards.

However, City’s attacking performance should not paper over another flawed defensive display that saw them draw for the eighth time in nine Premier League games.

Tim Rich, The Independent

On Saturday as City, fresh from victories against Arsenal and Chelsea, found themselves once more unable to shake off the kind of team they are expected to swat aside, Bellamy produced a single, perfect pass that dissected two defenders to allow Micah Richards to drive home an improbably good goal. That he was part of a defence that conceded three against a Bolton side struggling for their lives was not lost on Richards afterwards. Manchester City are not a team built on the galactico principle of Real Madrid where defenders are seen as an afterthought. Gareth Barry, Vincent Kompany, Nigel de Jong, Kolo Touré and Joleon Lescott are an array of defenders and defensive midfielders who have cost the club £78m and have kept one clean sheet in the league since August.

Jeremy Alexander, The Guardian

City's trouble was that, barring Bellamy and Tévez, they did not engage top gear until they were behind or a man short. A club website story trumpeted: "City not resting on their laurels, says Kompany". Would those laurels be a first win in eight games or the League Cup in 1976? At first go they fell back into their rut of draws.

Tévez deserved his two goals and Bellamy, fired by a marker, Gretar Steinsson, with more tattoos than himself, wonderfully made the second for Micah Richards. But Emmanuel Adebayor was disengaged, then substituted when he should have been winning the game against 10 men.

Nick Szczepanik, The Times

So was this a triumph or disaster for City? On the one hand, they scored three goals on a ground where they had not found the net in the league since 2004. On the other, it was their eighth draw in nine league matches, they had conceded three to a team in the relegation zone — and it could have been more.

Hughes was reluctant to find fault with his defence, although he might change his mind after studying the DVD. He also praised his players’ character. “A year ago we might have lost this game,” he said. “We’ve dug in. We’ve only been beaten once. There have been draws. Some have been frustrating, but others, like today, are a good point given the circumstances of the game.”

Graham Chase, Telegraph

Although Hughes was probably right in the assertion that if City had been 3-2 down and reduced to 10 men a year ago they would not have come away with anything from the Reebok, there are two ways of looking at the developments at Eastlands.

They have suffered one defeat all season and are unbeaten in 13 matches but have picked up just 11 points from their last nine league games and continue to look shaky at the back.