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City roll past Spurs, Barca edge Real Madrid in America

John Stones opened the scoring
John Stones opened the scoring

Manchester City coasted to a 3-0 International Champions Cup victory over Tottenham in Nashville.

New signings Ederson, Danilo and Kyle Walker were all named in the City starting line-up but it was John Stones who opened the scoring 10 minutes into the game.

Raheem Sterling and Brahim Diaz then added further goals in the second half to wrap up victory.

City opened the scoring when Kevin De Bruyne's free-kick flicked off the wall and fell to the feet of England centre-half Stones, who made no mistake from close range.

And Sterling doubled the advantage with 16 minutes when he waltzed through an almost static Tottenham defence and turned the ball past Michel Vorm.

Victory was wrapped up in stoppage time when Tottenham failed to clear their lines after a series of shots were blocked and Diaz popped up to make it two goals from two games with a simple tap in.

Elsewhere, Real Madrid boss Zinedine Zidane insisted he is "not bothered" by Saturday night's friendly defeat to their LaLiga arch-rivals Barcelona in Miami.

The Spanish and European champions went two goals down inside seven minutes thanks to Lionel Messi and Ivan Rakitic, before Mateo Kovacic and Marco Asensio forced parity heading into half-time.

Gerard Pique grabbed Barca's clincher five minutes after the restart, however, leaving Real winless after three International Champions Cup games.

Zidane, whose team face the Catalans again in the Supercopa de Espana in two weeks' time, can now turn his thoughts to the UEFA Super Cup meeting with Manchester United in Skopje.

"This is pre-season and I'm sure that the results we've achieved weren't what we were expecting, but this doesn't alter anything," the Frenchman told realmadrid.com.

"The important thing is to be ready for August 8. I saw some good things out there, but also some things I didn't like.

"We've got to be patient, work hard and be ready for the UEFA Super Cup.

"I'm not bothered by the defeat. It always hurts, we don't like to lose but that's not the most important thing. We need to improve and change a few things."

Barca head coach Ernesto Valverde, who succeeded Luis Enrique this summer, felt the friendly triumph acted as a warm-up for the two-legged Supercopa showdown, which starts on August 13.

After full-time at the Hard Rock Stadium, the former Athletic Bilbao manager told fcbarcelona.es: "Those matches will be different - there is no such thing as a friendly against Real.

"My team started the game very well and I was happy with how they dominated proceedings.

"We had many chances to extend the scoreline further. It was an opportunity to see how great these players are, especially Messi who was extraordinary."

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