MANCHESTER, Sept 15: Sergio Aguero kept up his explosive start to the season by scoring a hat trick for Manchester City in a 4-0 win over Borussia Moenchengladbach in a rescheduled Champions League match on Wednesday.
A 24-hour delay, after the original Group C fixture was postponed Tuesday because of torrential rain, didn't put City off its stride as coach Pep Guardiola earned his seventh straight victory to open his tenure at the English club.
Aguero now has nine goals in five games this season after tapping in the opening goal in the ninth minute, converting a penalty in the 28th and completing his hat trick by rounding the goalkeeper in a one-on-one chance in the 77th.
It was his second European hat trick of the campaign, after one against Steaua Bucharest in the playoff round, and he could have more ahead in another dominant, energetic display early in the Guardiola regime.
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Aguero was substituted for Kelechi Iheanacho, who wrapped up the scoring in stoppage time with a powerful close-range strike.
There were positives all over the field for City, perhaps no more so than the sight of Ilkay Gundogan running midfield on his debut following an offseason move from Borussia Dortmund. It was the Germany international's first game since April, when he dislocated his right kneecap, and he showed no sign of rust.
It will be Aguero taking the plaudits again, though. The striker was back in the team amid a three-match domestic suspension for elbowing an opponent, and he couldn't have asked for two nicer opportunities to find the net in the first half.
He poked in the first goal from close range after Aleksandar Kolarov had whipped in a low cross from the left wing.
Aguero then capped a dominant first half-hour for City by converting a penalty for the third time this season, sending the goalkeeper the wrong way after Christoph Kramer's trip on Gundogan just inside the area.
Those goals quietened the reduced contingent of Moenchengladbach fans who had stayed on an extra day to support their team. Some of them had slept in a coach at the Etihad overnight and when they got to their seats for the match, they found an absence letter — drafted and signed by the club's sporting director Max Eberl — that could be given to the fans' employers to explain why they might have missed work.
The German club had its moments — Lars Stindl brought a great save from City goalkeeper Claudio Bravo from a well-worked corner routine — but couldn't stifle City's attacking threat in the second half.
Aguero was twice denied by goalkeeper Yann Sommer before completing his hat trick after being played through by Raheem Sterling. Aguero rounded Sommer and tapped into an empty net.
