Manchester City lost to AmaZulu in the Nelson Mandela Football invitational at the Moses Mabhida Stadium, South Africa on Thursday night, the same night they agreed a deal with Fiorentina for Stevan Jovetic.
Bongani Ndulula opened scoring for the Premier Soccer League (PSL) club in the 20th minute, intercepting a poor back pass from Aleksandar Kolarov before beating goalkeeper Joe Hart. James Milner leveled up for the tourists six minutes later and with the match poised for a draw, Abdul Razak was adjudged to have fouled Marc van Heerden.
Nyadombo (87th minute) stepped up to take the resulting spotkick and buried his shot past Costel Pantilimon.
New manager Manuel Pellegrini couldn’t witness the AmaZulu game. He had returned to Chile from South Africa to attend to personal matter although he could rejoin the squad in Hong Kong early next week.
Transfer.
City has agreed a £22m deal with Fiorentina for the services of Montenegro striker Jovetic, subject to a medical on Friday.
23-year-old Jovetic will be City’s fourth high-profile signing of the summer as new manager Pellegrini looks forward to a new era with the Etihad club.
With Jesus Navas (£14.9m from Sevilla), Fernandinho (£30m from Shakhtar Donetsk) and Alvaro Negredo, who City confirmed today (Friday) as their new £24.5m signing from Sevilla already a done deal, last year Premier League runner-ups have stepped up the move to reshape the squad for the coming season.
And a new acquisition is in line, not Jovetic. Sources in Portugal revealed that the Dubai consortium-backed club made a fresh £25.8m bid for Benfica’s Argentinean right winger Eduardio Salvio as reported by the Independent.
City have not yet issued any comment on the enquiries about the bid but Benfica are believed to have already kick-started the search for a replacement for the wanted winger, who has been described as a similar player to Spaniard Navas.
