Vassell double for City haunts former club

Manchester City's Darius Vassell celebrates after scoring against Aston Villa during a Premiereship match at The City Of Manchester Stadium, Manchester. Manchester City won 3-1.

Darius Vassell scored twice against his old club Aston Villa in a 3-1 Premiership victory from an opportunist strike and then a superb piece of finishing.

Vassell, bought by City manager Stuart Pearce from Villa in the summer, found the net in the fourth and 26 minutes which gave the visitors too much to do to get back into the match.

City moved up four places to fourth spot in the table but Villa were left way down at fifth from bottom.

City's Claudio Reyna did not start after picking up knee and ankle injuries in last weekend's defeat at Arsenal, bringing about Pearce giving Lee Croft a Premiership debut. Andy Cole was also back in the side.

Villa were without Juan Pablo Angel, giving Luke Moore a chance in the starting XI, but pre-match drama was to come. Villa's Danish keeper Thomas Sorensen twisted his ankle in the warm-up to hand a debut to Stuart Taylor who signed from Arsenal in the summer.

It turned into a terrible start for Taylor who saw the ball go into his own net for the first goal after a defensive mix-up.

Vassell headed on a long ball from Sylvain Distin but with Villa's Liam Ridgewell and Jlloyd Samuel covering, it looked as though the ball was going to be picked up by Taylor.

But Samuel did not see that Taylor had come out of his box to take the ball and the full-back disastrously headed over him allowing Vassell to easily run on to it and score into an empty net.

Vassell also hit the post after good work from Cole before he got his second.

Cole was again involved and his lobbed pass sailed over Ridgewell and Vassell turned quickly and rifled a first-time volley into the left hand corner of the net.

Ridgewell then pulled a goal back for Villa midway through the second half from close in after a cross from the left.

Cole made the match safe for City however with a left foot shot from the edge of the box on 83 minutes which took a lucky deflection and sailed over hapless keeper Taylor for the third goal.

English Premiership table after Monday's match (played, won, drawn, lost, goals for, goals against, points):