It took Joleon Lescott nine games to finally score his first goal for Manchester City and now they are coming along in twos.

The former Everton defender has taken time to settle into Mark Hughes' Eastlands revolution after his protracted and bitter £24million move from Goodison Park.

Lescott, 27, had a big reputation with the Toffees for scoring goals, and reached double figures in one recent season.

But his goal against Fulham on Saturday was his first for his new club, and he followed that up with a crucial header to help City on their way to a 5-1 Carling Cup victory against Scunthorpe that takes his new club into the quarter-finals.

Lescott is relieved to have got on the score-sheet, to prove to his new club that the scoring exploits at Everton were no flash in the pan.

He said: "I did get a bit of a reputation for goals from set-pieces, so it is nice to have finally scored one for City.

"But the main thing is that we score goals, nobody is really fussed who does. There was no argument about mine on Saturday, everyone knew I got the last touch.

"I just hope to be in the right place at the right time. That's all a defender can do.

"Every time I go up now someone on the bench says, you have to score. They think I should have scored a few more by now.

"We work really hard in training on set-pieces, but at the moment we are more concerned with keeping clean sheets.

"If we do go forward and score goals it is a bonus. Now we want a clean sheet at Birmingham on Saturday, it's eight games now since we had one.

"Scunthorpe put up a really good display, but they were always going to work hard against us. But once we got going the goals started to come, and it was a good performance with five different players scoring."

Lescott has seen his qualities questioned since his move to Eastlands, while the acrimony from his move from Merseyside still annoys him.

He said: "I feel I am settling into City's defence with every passing game. The longer you play alongside people the better and easier it gets.

"We haven't kept a clean sheet for a number of games now, so that is the first objective and we are determined to achieve that.

"Everyone in the back four is relatively new to the club, maybe it's because of that. At the moment we are not doing what we are there to do, keep clean sheets, and we must start doing our jobs."

The details of his move to City have been well aired, but Lescott still feels hard-done-by from the fall-out which eventually saw Everton boss David Moyes drop him for a "poor attitude".

Lescott said: "Moving to City was one of the best days of my life. It was not about the money, I remember hearing one of the coaches at Everton had said that about me. And I thought, 'How could you say that when you know me as well as you do?'.

"Believe me, I had a great contract at Everton. I didn't need any more.

"But City represented a chance to achieve real success faster than it was going to happen at Everton. People talk about David Moyes maybe one day going to Manchester United, and that's fine because managers can afford to wait.

"But as a player you do not have that luxury, and I felt I couldn't wait.

"I felt that when I joined City, that they were better equipped than Everton to finish fourth.

"I reached the FA Cup final with them last season, which was an achievement. The next step is to win a trophy, and I sense that feeling.

"There are World Cup players here, winners here, and if we are all pushing in the same direction then we should achieve things."