Manchester City 3 Bournemouth 1 – Mixed farewell for De Bruyne and Marmoush’s rocket

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Manchester City beat Bournemouth 3-1 on Tuesday to pick up a vital three points in the race for Champions League qualification.

A stunning 30-yard strike from Omar Marmoush after 14 minutes gave City the lead at the Etihad Stadium, before Bernardo Silva doubled their tally just before half-time.

Kevin De Bruyne, who was making his last home appearance before departing this summer, missed an open goal from inside the six-yard box in the first half and was then substituted with 20 minutes remaining following Mateo Kovacic’s red card.

However, the hosts added a third late on through Nico Gonzalez before Bournemouth’s consolation goal in added time.

The victory moves City up to third in the Premier League table ahead of the final round of matches on Sunday, with Pep Guardiola’s team two points clear of sixth-placed Aston Villa (and with a vastly superior goal difference).

Here, Sam Lee analyses the key talking points from the game.

De Bruyne will have hoped for a better goodbye 

Guardiola was said to be overly sentimental when he kept De Bruyne on for the entirety of the FA Cup final on Saturday, but the same could not be said about tonight; as soon as Kovacic was sent off for denying a goalscoring opportunity following a loose pass by Josko Gvardiol, Guardiola called for Nico — and to the surprise and perhaps horror of everybody else in the stadium, it was the No 17 that came up on the board.

De Bruyne applauds the crowd after being substituted (Stu Forster/Getty Images)

This game was all about getting three points and saying goodbye to De Bruyne, and in that sense it was mission accomplished, but the Belgian’s evening was hardly memorable for the right reasons, given he hit the bar from  yards with the goal completely open.

First Mohamed Salah last night, now Kevin de Bruyne tonight.

The Belgian hits the crossbar in front of an open goal from inside the six yard box.

How did he miss?!#MCFC | #AFCB | #MCIBOU

📸 @SkySportsPL pic.twitter.com/UmKW0wSz0u

— The Athletic | Football (@TheAthleticFC) May 20, 2025

Other than that, he played well here and it still felt that he might yet get a goodbye goal before the end, but those hopes were dashed thanks to a bit of calamity elsewhere.

Marmoush’s glorious strike stuns crowd

Anybody who has played football has been in this situation. You are moving towards goal and nobody is closing you down. Literally nobody. There is too much room. It would be wrong not to shoot. So you shoot.

What happened next is not quite so common for the rest of us: Marmoush’s strike flew into the top corner, absolutely rasping as it went. It only seemed to lose momentum at the last second, just enough to dip below the crossbar.

A moment of magic from Omar Marmoush.

The Egyptian rifles home his seventh Premier League goal with an absolute rocket.

Is that the goal of the season? #MCFC | #AFCB | #MCIBOU

🎥 @SkySportsPL pic.twitter.com/6YLdKAgQ7G

— The Athletic | Football (@TheAthleticFC) May 20, 2025

It was such a good goal that each of the replays of it shown inside the stadium attracted a different sort of ‘ooh’. On this De Bruyne farewell occasion, the reaction was actually reminiscent of a De Bruyne screamer against Huddersfield in 2018 that everybody in the stadium, including the two sets of players, stopped to watch on the big screen.

Back to the present: on a night when two of City’s four January signings — Vitor Reis and Abdukodir Khusanov — were not even in the squad, and Nico was on the bench yet again, Marmoush once more stood out as the most decisive winter arrival by some way.

Marmoush celebrates his wonder goal (Stu Forster/Getty Images)

He still has a lot to polish up before he can be considered a truly reliable contributor but goals like this, and a similarly good one against Brighton, are real difference makers and signs of his talent.

Did De Bruyne farewell overshadow others who might be on way out too?

As much as there was plenty riding on this game in its own right, the evening was most commonly referred to as De Bruyne’s farewell, with the Belgian being given the opportunity to speak to the Etihad Stadium crowd for the final time.

Between the banners and the chants, as well as the unveiling of a new mosaic and a road named in his honour at the training ground, it was very much a fitting finale. However, there will almost certainly be others who shared the pitch with him — and some left out altogether — who will also be on the way out this summer, who were not afforded, for obvious reasons, the chance to do it properly.

City fans pay tribute to the departing Belgian (Paul Ellis/AFP via Getty Images)

Ederson, for example, could well leave in the summer and he is somebody who has arguably made, in his own way, a contribution every bit as big as De Bruyne has to the club. Others will not have quite the same body of work behind them, but will surely be feeling sentimental as they head into the summer, knowing they are likely to move on.

James McAtee, for example, has barely written his story at City but has been at the club for 12 years, while Jack Grealish has let two seasons slip through his fingers after helping City win the treble in 2022-23. There may well be others, too, but only time will tell.

Rodri makes long-awaited return

All the big cheers were inevitably reserved for De Bruyne and the goals, but somebody else did sneak into the equation: Rodri was back after an eight-month absence with an ACL tear, and the sight of him jogging down the touchline in the second half brought the Etihad to its feet.

Much to everybody’s surprise, he then came on for the final 10 minutes, which presented the slightly surreal scenario of the home crowd wildly cheering his strut to the touchline while Marmoush bent a free kick narrowly over the bar.  Had he scored, it would have been one of the most bizarre noises ever heard inside a football stadium.

Rodri being instructed by Guardiola before coming on (Stu Forster/Getty Images)

Bournemouth, by the way, were a really tough nut to crack for City, and Kovacic’s red card made the possibility of a comeback, albeit from 2-0, more likely. Lewis Cook’s red then levelled the playing field, but Rodri was still a very useful addition to the side as City actually added to their tally through the other rescue act, Nico. The visitors scored in added time through Daniel Jebbison but it was too little, too late.

What did Guardiola say?

We will bring you this after he has spoken at the post-match press conference.

What next for Manchester City?

Sunday, May 25: Fulham (Away), Premier League, 4pm UK, 11am ET

(Top photo: Paul Ellis/AFP via Getty Images)

This news was originally published on this post .

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