Manchester City heaped pressure on Premier League leaders Arsenal after beating Swansea 3-2 at the Liberty Stadium.

Swansea started brightly with Wilfried Bony narrowly missing the bottom corner after striking from distance. However City's counter attacking heaped pressure on the home side and when a corner was loosely cleared, Brazilian Fernandinho stepped up and smashed it in from outside the area to make it 1-0 to City.

Michael Laudrup's side refused to let City dominate proceedings and played with style in front of a roaring home crowd. Jonjo Shelvey continued to show why he is so reverred as a midfielder and he came close to scoring after his shot missed the target by inches. Jonathan De Guzman had a real scoring opportunity when he was put through on goal but Joe Hart was quick off his line to make the save and clear the danger.

There was a penalty claim in the 38th minute when Ashley Williams' shot fired into Vincent Kompany's arm, but it was not clear enough for referee Phil Dowd to point to the spot.

Minutes later though Swansea were rewarded for their efforts when Bony leaped above the City defence to latch on to a De Guzman cross, heading it neatly into the bottom right hand corner and leaving Hart no chance.

In the second half City had a chance to go ahead through Alvaro Negredo after Swansea defender Chico Flores let him nick the ball in his own area, but Tremmel made a decent save to deny him.

In the 58th minute Yaya Toure made it 2-1 to City with a  great strike into the bottom corner and soon after Aleksander Kolarov smashed one in with his right foot after dispossessing Wayne Routledge.

Swansea were not out for the count though and a late strike from Bony got them back in the game but it was too little too late.