Bristol City 0-2 Stoke City: Visitors claim comfortable win ailing Robins
- Published
Stoke City celebrate after Steven Fletcher (second right) made it 2-0
Goals by Nick Powell and Steven Fletcher kept Stoke's faint play-off hopes alive as they sentenced Bristol City to a seventh straight home defeat.
Powell netted his 12th goal of the campaign to give the Potters a first-half lead, finishing off Jacob Brown's cross.
Fletcher then sealed the points with a curling free-kick that zipped beyond Dan Bentley just after the hour mark.
Stoke's first away success in 12 games keeps them in 11th place, seven points off the top six, while the Robins remain 14th.
Bristol City handed 18-year-old Sam Bell his first league start - but the young forward's full debut lasted just a quarter of an hour before he was forced off with a knock.
Stoke took advantage of that disruption, with Brown chasing a ball down the right and pulling it back for Powell, who rifled in at the second attempt after his initial shot was charged down.
The hosts rarely threatened an equaliser before half-time, although Adam Davies was called into action to block with his legs when Antoine Semenyo breached the Potters' back line.
Stoke then doubled their lead after the break when Brown was felled just outside the box and Powell teed up Fletcher to whip a clinical left-foot finish into the roof of the net.
Nigel Pearson's side, who never looked like retrieving the deficit, have found the net just once during those seven consecutive losses at Ashton Gate.
Bristol City manager Nigel Pearson told BBC Radio Bristol:
"There's no hiding the fact that our performance was not the level we're looking for. I want to see a more collective, stronger performance in terms of physicality and in terms of our ability to deal with setbacks.
"There were some good individual performances - I thought Han-Noah Massengo, in particular, was excellent today.
"If we had more players who showed his sort of personal drive to make things happen in a game, we'd be better off.
"The reality is our home form is exceptionally poor and we need to rectify that. If players don't want to be part of the journey going forward, there will be people missing out."
Stoke boss Michael O'Neill told BBC Radio Stoke:
"There was a good energy in the team. If you look at the players we have absent and a very young bench, it was a really good performance, given the injuries we have, to come here and win the game.
"We were very assured and I thought we had a lot of control and dominance in the first half of the game. It's unusual to play away from home and have that.
"In the second half we got the goal at a good time. We knew there'd be a little bit of a reaction from Bristol City, but I thought we saw the game out comfortably."
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