Cameron buzzes about Stoke display against Man City

Geoff Cameron was effusive in his praise of the Stoke City performance which knocked Manchester City off the top of the Premier League table on Saturday.

Marko Arnautovic scored a first-half brace as a Potters side inspired by Xherdan Shaqiri tore Manuel Pellegrini’s men apart at the Britannia Stadium.

Although the final score read 2-0, Arnautovic was unfortunate not to at least double his tally, while the only negative of Shaqiri’s day came when he somehow failed to tap in a third as Mark Hughes’ side ran the title favourites ragged before Leicester City leapfrogged them at the summit later that afternoon.

United States international Cameron helped keep Kevin De Bruyne, David Silva and Raheem Sterling in check at one end and felt Stoke’s all-round performance was near perfect.

“You can’t say anything badly – we all played really, really well,” the 30-year-old said.

“We worked for one other, pressured, made it difficult for them to play and dominated the play. We could have had more goals, more opportunities.

“Saying that, we kept a clean sheet, got two goals and are happy with the performance – two wins back to back, both at home, and we’re improving our home form.

“We know how difficult it is to play a team like Man City and the quality of players they have, but I think we nullified them and I think we were fantastic.”

Hughes’ decision to utilise Bojan as a striker, with Arnautovic and Shaqiri either side, was a bold move, yet it paid dividends for the former Citizens boss.

Cameron and Glenn Whelan provided the defensive protection in midfield, but the former praised those ahead of him on the pitch for proving to be constant menaces in Hughes’ system.

“It allowed them to have the freedom,” he said of Hughes’ tactics.

“They pressured the ball. When the midfield slid over, we nicked the ball and then our first pass was to their feet, and they were running at them.

“When you’ve got their defenders running towards their own net and we’re running with the ball, it’s always difficult. I thought we did that fantastically.

“For me, it was just fantastic all around. Those three guys – they gave them hell all game and they created a lot of things – Marko was unlucky not to finish with a hat-trick, but I think everybody put in a performance, everybody did their jobs and worked for one another.”