Manchester City drew with 10-man Stoke at the Britannia Stadium - but still moved into the Premier League top four.

The Blues looked to be gaining control after Abdoulaye Faye's red card, but Glenn Whelan scored to put the Potters ahead.

City battled hard and earned their reward when Gareth Barry scored the equaliser, but were arguably lucky that Ryan Shawcross's last gasp goal was ruled out.

The match took a while to get going and it took just 25 minutes for the plaintive cry to go up from the City fans: “We want football!”

There was no secret about what was to visit itself upon the heads of Mancini's players.

And yet they singularly failed to deal with it, and did not have the wit or the willpower to react to it, even with a one-man advantage.

A win would have put the Blues in pole position in the race for fourth place, three points clear of Sunday's opponents Liverpool with a game in hand.

That win looked a million miles away all night, as the Blues came up with a performance which was a collective failure, as much by the management as by the 11 players on the field.

The game could have turned on three refereeing decisions, arguably all of which were flunked by Alan Wiley.

He failed to spot Patrick Vieira plant his foot into the groin of Whelan after five minutes, the City man aggrieved at having had his heels clipped.

He also failed to spot Faye's trip on Emmanuel Adebayor on 53 minutes as the City man muscled past him en route to goal.

Thankfully the referee's assistant had not been at the half-time pies, and flagged – red card for Faye, one-man advantage for City. And Shawcross's late goal might have been allowed on another day. After it all, City left with a point.

Mancini is not afraid to chuck in the odd eyebrow-raising change, and he did it again at the Britannia Stadium.

Wayne Bridge put in one of his best performances against Stoke on Saturday, but found himself on the bench three days later, with Javier Garrido taking his place.

Garrido was very much a stop-gap, a man dragged back from the brink of departure when the Blues ran into a Christmas-time injury crisis.

He did a fair job, but was always going to step aside once Bridge was fit.

But it appears that Mancini and his staff were concerned about over-stretching Bridge's knee, and his stamina, after three exacting matches in eight days following a two-month lay-off.

City changes

As revealed by M.E.N. Sport, Mancini also beefed up his defence with the return of Micah Richards, and packed Gareth Barry, Nigel de Jong and Patrick Vieira into a very solid-looking midfield.

De Jong had talked before the game about how important the first 15 minutes would be.

But in that quarter of an hour, the Blues fell straight into Stoke's unsubtle trap, as the home side virtually camped in their half.

The Blues handed them five throw-ins, some of them unnecessary, within Rory Delap range. And they chucked in four free kicks, just for variety.

Thankfully, the defence was more switched-on than it had been on Saturday, with Joleon Lescott putting in one important block from Faye's goalbound header.

It was ugly stuff. Why anyone would pay hard-earned dosh to watch such sterile stuff on a turnip patch of a pitch, is a mystery, but the Stoke fans lapped it up.

When City did get a chance, from a Roque Santa Cruz knockdown, Barry screwed his shot wide.

It took the City fans 25 minutes to suggest to the manager that Shaun Wright-Phillips – whose groin problem meant he was also left on the bench – would be a rather good idea.

But even the sparky little winger struggled to put some vitality into a lifeless City.

There was an air of inevitability when, on 72 minutes, the home side took the lead, courtesy of two sloppy pieces of play which typified City's night.

Adam Johnson, bedded down in the realities of Premier League life after his excellent home debut last week, miskicked straight to Whelan.

The former City youngster scuffed his shot but Shay Given – so often untouched when City suffer from a bad performance – made a hash of his save and the ball trickled into the corner.

City mounted an assault which owed more to hopeful desperation than any kind of guile, and - irony of ironies – drew level with a goal straight out of the Stoke handbook.

A percentage ball pumped high into the box found the head of Adebayor. His header fell to Barry, who hit the post but still managed to force in the rebound for the scrappiest point City will ever win.

The bad news? These two sides meet again next Wednesday – unless there is a significant improvement from the Blues, it could be a game which sullies the FA Cup's reputation for ever!

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