Manchester City took a small, but equally important step towards the Premier League summit with a slender 1-0 away victory against Sam Allardyce's Black Cats at the Stadium of Light.
Sergio Agüero scored the game's only goal, after 16 minutes - finishing a well-worked piece of passing build-up on the edge of the area between himself, Yaya Touré and David Silva, before the ball was fizzed low into the box by Jesús Navas on the right-hand side.
Chances go begging in unpredictable affair
Kelechi Iheanacho was rewarded after his hat-trick against Aston Villa with a rare start, and utilised his physical prowess to good effect - shrugging off two challenges to square unselfishly for Sergio, who curled an effort over the crossbar with goalkeeper Vito Mannone left scrambling to his left.
Sunderland's lack of composure in-front of goal was evident to see by the way they approached play in the final third initially, failing to test Joe Hart with a few wayward attempts from promising situations as City's backline struggled to deal with aerial balls and teasing passes fired in at awkward angles.
Hart forced to make crucial stops
Despite not being troubled for large periods, Hart had to be alert as the match ticked by though, as Allardyce's men began to smell blood and came close with a few efforts on-target during the second-half. Jermain Defoe and Billy Jones were thwarted by great stops from England's number one goalkeeper, whilst Man of the Match, Nicolas Otámendi, made an injury-time goalline clearance to relieve the pressure upon his teammates as they snatched all three points in an unpredictable affair.
With a home encounter against Leicester on Saturday afternoon, those three points could prove crucial as the race for the title hots up.