Negredo Scores Hat-Trick, Manchester City Cruise

 6-0 

Manchester City and West Ham United met today for the first-leg of a Capital One Cup semifinal.  Manchester City have only conceded one goal in the tournament and finished ten in the first three matches.  West Ham had a big win against Tottenham to reach this stage of the Cup, but their last result was a dreadful 5-nil loss to Nottingham Forest in the FA Cup.

Playing at home, Manchester City got off to a hot start and scored three goals in the first-half.  Álvaro Negredo scored the first two, both coming from well played through-balls.  Yaya Touré first played a long though-ball from behind midfield that split the West Ham centerbacks.  Negredo timed his run perfectly and finished with a confident first-touch finish (12').

Negredo then linked up with fellow striker Edin Dzeko to get behind the West Ham back line.  Dzeko played the ball forward into space and Negredo was able to beat keeper Adrián coming off his line with a sliding shot (26').

Yaya Touré scored the last goal of the first-half with an impressive individual effort.  Touré jumped on a loose ball at midfield and found space to run at goal.  The West Ham centerbacks did not step to Touré and allowed him to dribble all the way into their own box.  Touré was more than obliged to take the space and scored rather easily (40').

West Ham had nothing to build on heading into the second-half, and only found themselves further down by the end of the match.  Negredo scored a third goal for City when a pass from David Silva was deflected inside the West Ham box.  Negredo did not appear to be the intended target, but off the deflection, Silva's pass fell right in front of him and he finished first-touch to complete his hat-trick (49').

The other striker Dzeko was able to add to the goal tally late in the match as West Ham had less and less to play for.  Two crosses from the left flank gave Dzeko a pair of scoring opportunities that the striker capitalized.  First Clichy rolled a cross to the near-post that Dzeko finished with a sliding effort (60').  Then substitute Kolarov played a cross to the middle of the box that Dzeko was able to step into and drive into the net (89').

West Ham have now conceded eleven goals in their last two match.  The Hammers will have a second chance to get back at City when the two clubs replay on the 21st, but it will take a miracle to overcome this deficit.  Manchester City in all likelihood will reach the final and could face rivals United if they rally back to beat Sunderland in their second-leg meeting.