Manchester City have got exactly what they paid for To be really specific, City may have returned to the summit for the first time since Bell, Summerbee and Lee were in their pomp the moment Roberto Mancini took off Samir Nasri, sent Nigel de Jong on to mind the safe and pushed Touré forward to smash down Newcastle's defences. In the centre of midfield Cheick Tioté and Yohan Cabaye had hunted down sky blue shirts with great vigour and Agüero and Carlos Tévez could find no way through. Touré was like a magnificent tank with the handbrake suddenly released. You might say he "rumbled" through the heart of Newcastle's team but he is a lot more elegant than that. Rarely has such a big player been able to glide so smoothly. With the game in front of him he scatters and evades in equal measure. There is a sense of inevitability about his surges. Not since Roy Keane and Patrick Vieira has a midfielder with defensive talents been able to switch into such a destructive attacking mode. His first goal came eight minutes after his redeployment as a No 10 and was no desperate smash from outside the box. With a slice of the Newcastle net visible he pretty much passed the ball past Tim Krul. Nineteen minutes later a counter-attack that started with a meaty clearing header by Kompany found Touré on the edge of Krul's six-yard box, where he killed off Newcastle's late revival with a left-foot finish. Kompany and Touré are heading for the Mount Rushmore of City legends. What fun Papiss Cissé had been having at the expense of English defences until he ran into the mighty Kompany, who can head, tackle, block, close-off, out-sprint and move the ball with equal certainty. Cissé"s magnificent pair against Chelsea would not be repeated on Kompany's patch. Along with Joe Hart - and Gareth Barry, who deserves his share of credit - City's closers set about crushing Newcastle's resistance. Only Queens Park Rangers, at home next Sunday, now stand between them and deliverance. Outsiders have wrung a lot of comedy from City's attempts at mass integration. Tévez's antics and Mario Balotelli's oddball act have kept us amused. There have been fights on the training ground and bust-ups between players and Mancini. At times it looked as if money was failing in its sacred duty to deliver the title and was instead undermining everything from within. But if you look past the profligacy and the curfew-violations you can see a formidable core of players who want more for their efforts than a mansion in Cheshire and a car that would not look out of place in F1. Some of those from warmer climes will feel they need trophies to justify living in the north-west of England rather than Spain or Italy. Either way, no one can accuse City of gratuitous hoovering. They have instilled a spirit and a purpose as well. At no time was that mission more endangered than when Touré was absent at the Africa Cup of Nations. They missed his power, his locomotion and his ability to get them out of trouble. With his two La Liga and one Champions League medals, Touré seems to see possibilities on the pitch where others see roadblocks. He is never stressed by a clock ticking down or daunted by the opposition throwing bodies in his path. City were eight points behind United last month and are now one victory against QPR away from a victory that will shape English football for years. You never know, Sheikh Mansour may even fly over to watch. His tally of games seen at a place that has cost him the best part of £1 billion is still only one (against Liverpool). This remains the most bizarre statistic in all of football. United's slip-ups against Everton and Wigan laid the ground for City to surge back from second place in the table. But their own resilience is not in question. They are not windfall recipients. After their wobble they thundered on again, beating United last Monday night and then subduing Newcastle. "He is experienced, he won trophies at Barcelona, he is a fantastic player, he can play in different positions," Mancini said, reeling off Yaya Touré"s virtues. A match saver and a match winner, he is blessed with a rare ability to choose his moment and then go forth and execute. With the end in sight, the light shines brightest on the strength of Touré and Kompany.