BRITISH forces have not always fared well in Jutland, as Admiral Sir John Jellicoe found out to his cost in the famous naval battle there 92-years ago.

 That bad form will have to change in two weeks’ time if City’s Euro adventure is not to come to an abrupt halt in northern Denmark.

 Mark Hughes is today unlikely to be quite as downcast as the one-time commander of the Grand Fleet was back in 1916 – but he could have been feeling considerably better had his men not started so poorly against the Wolves of Midtjylland.

 Fifteen minutes of sloppy passing, running down blind alleys and poor shooting were cruelly punished by the fleet-footed Danes.

 The Blues were masters of their own embarrassment. Elano was careless in aiming a free kick from the half way line – an error from which the home side never recovered properly – before Richard Dunne’s attempted clearance was blocked and Mikkel Thygesen slipped the ball to Danny Olsen to hammer home from just inside the box. 

 It left the home side as deflated as the popped ball that held up play for two minutes at the start of a bizarre evening.

Inappropriate

 Midtjylland may have been irreverently referred to a ‘Midget Land’ by some of the more linguistically challenged Blues fans ahead of this UEFA Cup qualifying tie, but the moniker could hardly have been more inappropriate.

 The Danes, with a fair sprinkling of Nigerians in their squad and a giant American defender – Daniel Califf – in their ranks, looked as though they had more in common with Gulliver than Lilliput.

 City chief Hughes correctly warned before the contest that the unbeaten Danish Super League leaders were both imposing and dynamic, two adjectives he would presumably like others to attach to his men when the Premier League gets under way this weekend. They will have to be much better than they were in this contest, for they were neither.

 After a poor beginning it gradually dawned on the home side that they might not be able to canter into the first round proper, but when they did rouse themselves from their torpor and impose themselves they couldn’t find the net.

Chipped

 Martin Petrov chipped over the keeper and bar from a tight angle and, after Danny Sturridge had dragged one shot wide, he rattled the bar with an altogether more breathtaking effort as half-time approached.

 Hughes, who spent much of the build up to the contest asserting his authority both publicly and privately, looked ready to get stuck into his players as they trooped off to some sporadic booing at the interval.

 The opening half came as a shock to the sparse crowd, the size of which suggests that the credit crunch is biting into football. Thankfully for City’s bank manager, the Blues’ season ticket sales have been healthy this summer and have not shrunk from last season’s total of around 26,000.

 Had a few more of the regulars ventured to Eastlands they would easily have been able to pick out some familiar old failings which need ironing out before some of the even bigger tests that lie ahead.

 These are most notably in front of goal where City continue to spurn too large a percentage of the chances made and on the right wing where Elano is not equipped to be a much needed mirror image of Petrov.

 There was an over-elaboration, too, at times and some of the passing choices were too ambitious against opponents who were far from the naïve travellers some had expected.

Ignominy
 City had chances to claw their way back to level terms but the giant Califf cleared off the line from Petrov, who then saved the home side more ignominy when he cleared off his own line when it appeared Sturridge might be credited with an own goal.

 Hughes sent on Bojinov, who would have started had he not tweaked his knee in training, and Etuhu, in a bid to salvage something from the wreckage but the Wolves kept them at bay until the overworked Petrov chipped a delicate free kick against the bar with Heinze a spectator.

 It could have been even worse for the Blues had Hart not saved well from Florescu and had the German referee seen Michael Johnson’s last-minute elbow on substitute Dennis Flinta.

 It was more out of frustration than anything else and it was easy to see why. It was a bad night to top off another strange week in the life of Manchester City.