When Manchester City were trailing QPR 2-1 in the 90th minute of their final Premier League game of the 2011/12 season, they were in need of a miracle.
Roberto Mancini had lost it on the touchline, the Mancheter City players looked dejected and the fans were distraught in the stands of the Etihad Stadium. Of course, we all know what happened next, but while everyone naturally remembers Sergio Aguero's iconic 94th-minute goal, it is perhaps what happens a couple of minutes beforehand that is just as important.
As David Silva rushed to take a corner, Edin Dzeko knew it was now or never: fight for that header against the QPR defence or risk throwing away the Premier League title. Fortunately for Manchester City fans, the Bosnian rose highest in the 92nd minute to head home, his goal arguably just as important as the one that followed from Aguero.
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"It was unreal," Dzeko tells FourFourTwo. @We knew we needed to win and we played well, but it simply wasn’t good enough. QPR were 2-1 up as we entered the final few minutes.
"I don’t think anyone believed we could make the turnaround and win the title. Perhaps only we, the players, still believed. But time was running out. We won a corner and I knew it was important for me to find a position to jump and challenge for the header; the ball came perfectly to me and I scored to make it 2-2.
"But there was no time to celebrate: we immediately grabbed the ball and started from the centre again. Everybody knows what happened after that. I didn’t manage to celebrate my goal, and it may be one of my most important goals in English football, but we won the title shortly after, which more than made up for that. It marked the beginning of Manchester City’s dominant era."
That goal was Dzeko's 14th Premier League goal of the season, and eventually proved his 72nd in all competitions at the club. But while he went on to win another Premier League title, lifted a FA Cup trophy and layed his hands on the League Cup, that single header proved most significant in his career at Manchester City.
Without his header, Martin Tyler would have never got his 'Aguerooooo' moment, City likely wouldn't have won that title and, in the long run, they might have never become the pre-eminent force in England they have turned into under Pep Guardiola.
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