Manchester City under Pep Guardiola | Pep on City v Liverpool ref: "He likes to be special"

They don't look very good. If we hadn't found a way to throw away wins in most of our recent fixtures we might smell blood. But they're reasonably comfortable in the top 4 picture still.

I can't see them winning much this year. That defence is shocking and the keeper is just dodgy. Dodgy keepers don't win trophies. As it's highly likely Pep will only stay 3 years, he'll really need to nail it next year. If he doesn't, the final year will be a 'Bayern last year' kind of anti-climax. Even if he does it then, he'd be fecking off at the end of the season and everything would have a cloud of uncertainty hanging over it.
 
notcool said:
He did really well against Chelsea. Pushed the wingbacks high and then had his free eights (Silva and De Bruyne) play in the spaces produced on either side of the pitch. They created a lot of chances and on the balance of play were the better team. I think it was really Willian's goal that did Man City in. Otamendi was very eager to nick the ball in front of Costa, as they said on MoTD. That happened last season in Bayern vs. Atletico, allowing Griezmann to score a goal, didn't it? The teams were drawing (on aggregate) like yesterday and Guardiola wanted his team to be aggressive and get the win. I guess it's a problem in the way Guardiola wants his teams to win.
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Not really though. Watched it with my City supporting mate and he was saying at 1-1 they would miss a bunch of chances then Chelsea would hit them on the break. Reckons it's happened in almost every game of theirs lately.

Pep needs to either get his team finishing off their chances or get them defending much better, no good dominating and not winning as we well know.

I also think they shouldn't be playing all 3 of Silva, De Bruyne and Gundogan. De Bruyne needs to come centrally like he was against us.
 
cyberman said:
Are defenders not part of the team?
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They were let down by individual errors which really isn't indicative of how well the team played. Poor finishing on the attacking end and lapses on the defending. Overall, if you ask me, they were the superior side. Chelsea were getting outplayed and dominated technically and tactically. Conte had no answer to the fluidity in their play and resorted to parking the bus, hoping to get a lucky break on the counter, something which they eventually did.

Don't let their recent results and current scoreline fool you, City will be a force once the team gels and gain some momentum. I wouldn't be surprised if the return game at Stamford Bridge ends with a thrashing to Chelsea.
 
A very damaging loss for City against title rivals at home, but I thought they played pretty well. That was match that they could have easily won 3-1. What it did highlight is that they seem to lack a bit of ruthlessness at both ends of the pitch. Their defensive is clearly as weakness, and Costa absolutely embarrassed their two centre backs. At the other end, they're not very clinical but I think they've got the players to correct that.
 
thepolice123 said:
They were let down by individual errors which really isn't indicative of how well the team played. Poor finishing on the attacking end and lapses on the defending. Overall, if you ask me, they were the superior side. Chelsea were getting outplayed and dominated technically and tactically. Conte had no answer to the fluidity in their play and resorted to parking the bus, hoping to get a lucky break on the counter, something which they eventually did.

Don't let their recent results and current scoreline fool you, City will be a force once the team gels and gain some momentum. I wouldn't be surprised if the return game at Stamford Bridge ends with a thrashing to Chelsea.
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Conte didn't try to answer the fluidity in their play. He played to his side's strengths and waited for City to make their characteristic mistakes. He won the tactical battle for sure.
 
The ones defending City and Pep over missed chances, are the same ones criticizing United and Jose over missed chances.
 
TwoSheds said:
Conte didn't try to answer the fluidity in their play. He played to his side's strengths and waited for City to make their characteristic mistakes. He won the tactical battle for sure.
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You are mixing up strategy and tactics
 
Raees said:
Yeah I think it's a case of people looking at the result and how the game ended and making out that Chelsea tactically outsmarted City throughout and that Conte is a genius.

There was some very poor refereeing and many chances being wasted by City. For most parts of the game they were splitting that Chelsea defence time and time again. Pep will be very pissed off for throwing that game away because it was essentially in their hands to win that game. They were the superior side but bottled it basically in front of goal and in their own defensive third.

Costa v Aguero, KDB v Hazard and Luiz v Stones were the key battles and KDB apart Chelsea's individuals made better decisions under pressure.

All it takes is an injury to Hazard or Costa and Chelsea will fall back into the pack whereas City for me are less reliant on individuals and have a dominant style of play regardless of who is playing. We will see what happens but if Chelsea keep their main men fit.. Then of course they will be pretty hard to stop but not impossible to catch imo.
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This.
 
PeteManic said:
Exactly - "was" - and that's why the game has passed Mourinho by. A panic appointment in a the year of the superstar PL manager.
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He still is. That's what I meant. Don't think game has passed Jose by and last few games were proof of that.
Nor was that a 'panic' appoitment.
 
TwoSheds said:
Am I? So soaking up pressure, then targeting Kolarov and Stones on the counter isn't tactics? Righto.
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No, but from a purely tactical pov, you can't say he won the game. City did exactly what they wanted for an hour, and created more than enough chances to put the game away. Conte's tactics didn't work in stopping city, nor in helping chelsea create chances of their own. They won because city failed to kill the game, gave them a chance to get back and folded after chelsea took it.
 
@giorno
Would you say that Conte's strategy of sitting back was better than Guardiola's of attacking? Is that what you mean by strategy?
 
Not quite. I think Conte expected the game to unfold like that, and his strategy of sitting deep, soak up the pressure and try to hit on the counter was forced given the absence of Matic which ruled out trying to press them high. Basically the strategy was keep your head into the game, stick to the plan, survive long enough and eventually we'll get our chance. Which is precisely what happened
 
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salford_ said:
If I was pep Joe Hart would be coming back next summer.
Or I'd sling millions Milan way and bring in Donnarumma
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Ok, maybe he was not his first choice, but Hart is not a goalkeeper to play for Pep.

En
ivaldo said:
It's funny how all these tactically superb managers like Jose, Klopp, Pep and Conte come to the PL and all of a sudden decide to play 'jurassic level' football. You would think if the league was being competed by morons any mid level manager could wander in and walk the League. This is such a tired stereotype use to bash the league, the different between the PL and La Liga/Bundesliga is the quality of player in the top tier teams, that's it.
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I will not lose much time with this, but I have the right to say that the Premier League is behind the Bundesliga, La Liga, Serie A and Ligue 1 at a tactical and technical level.

Of course those managers that you mentioned raise their level, but they are still behind the top 5 clubs in Europe, Real Madrid, Bayern, Barcelona, Juventus and Atletico Madrid, it is my opinion.

I just wanted to refute some simplistic analysis, like saying Pepe is a fraud because he lost a match, that is the tipycal behaviour of modern fans, maybe too much FM or FIFA.
 
kr0nix said:
I agree, Bravo is overall the superior keeper to Hart. As someone that has watched him for many years, what do you think are the reasons for his current struggles?
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For me Bravo is struggling to adapt to the Premier League, but his performances for Chile, Sociedad and Barcelona were very good.

Nothing against Joe Hart but for me he is not even a top 5 keeper in the Serie A, so for me it is strange to see all British pundits killing Bravo, but they never mention that Hart is not a top keeper in Serie A.

But yes, if Bravo does not improve until the end of the season, maybe they should try Oblak, the problem would be his price.

Maybe Bravo will adapt, but he is remebering me Barthez, never felt comfortable on the Premier League, and that does not mean that he was bad. But Hart with Pep will never be an option.
 
Raees said:
Yeah I think it's a case of people looking at the result and how the game ended and making out that Chelsea tactically outsmarted City throughout and that Conte is a genius.

There was some very poor refereeing and many chances being wasted by City. For most parts of the game they were splitting that Chelsea defence time and time again. Pep will be very pissed off for throwing that game away because it was essentially in their hands to win that game. They were the superior side but bottled it basically in front of goal and in their own defensive third.

Costa v Aguero, KDB v Hazard and Luiz v Stones were the key battles and KDB apart Chelsea's individuals made better decisions under pressure.

All it takes is an injury to Hazard or Costa and Chelsea will fall back into the pack whereas City for me are less reliant on individuals and have a dominant style of play regardless of who is playing. We will see what happens but if Chelsea keep their main men fit.. Then of course they will be pretty hard to stop but not impossible to catch imo.
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Pep has always played with as close to 10 midfielders as he can. He cuts teams open but its a characteristic that he doesnt like traditional strikers and his defenders are often not used to being under certain types of threat.

If he had let Aguero play more freely as a striker he may have buried some of the chances. But then they may not have dominated the midfield. Likewise in defence, if he had more traditional defenders.

Conte knew all this, played to it, and won. It's grasping at straws to say City were the better team but still lost 3-1.
 
SCP said:
I will not lose much time with this, but I have the right to say that the Premier League is behind the Bundesliga, La Liga, Serie A and Ligue 1 at a tactical and technical level.

Of course those managers that you mentioned raise their level, but they are still behind the top 5 clubs in Europe, Real Madrid, Bayern, Barcelona, Juventus and Atletico Madrid, it is my opinion.

I just wanted to refute some simplistic analysis, like saying Pepe is a fraud because he lost a match, that is the tipycal behaviour of modern fans, maybe too much FM or FIFA.
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So why do these managers all of a sudden become tactically inferior when they move to England, what compels them to set their teams with in a comparatively tactically naïve way just because they move countries?

It's not one game though is it?
 
ivaldo said:
So why do these managers all of a sudden become tactically inferior when they move to England, what compels them to set their teams with in a comparatively tactically naïve way just because they move countries?

It's not one game though is it?
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In some cases, culture. In others, club/fans. In others, it's the players. And in others, there's no difference. Don't think guardiola is working on the tactical aspect any less then he did at barcelona/bayern. I do believe his current group of players is not as smart and talented as the previous ones, so they are taking a longer time to adapt
 
giorno said:
In some cases, culture. In others, club/fans. In others, it's the players. And in others, there's no difference. Don't think guardiola is working on the tactical aspect any less then he did at barcelona/bayern. I do believe his current group of players is not as smart and talented as the previous ones, so they are taking a longer time to adapt
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Which would be fine, if the majority of these players didn't come from the Spanish and German leagues; the supposedly tactical superior leagues. They would've been seen as tactically cultured in comparison to their brutish PL counterparts prior to their transfer, yet as soon as they move to England they seem to magically lose this trait, the same with the managers.

The difference is the quality in those teams in comparison to the English sides, any tactical difference is negligible.
 
It's odd that some people are using Pep's slight struggles to promote the quality of English teams as opposed to Spanish or German. I mean, by the same token you'd have to say Serie A was far in front of all of them considering what Conte's done at Chelsea.
 
SCP said:
Ok, maybe he was not his first choice, but Hart is not a goalkeeper to play for Pep.

En

I will not lose much time with this, but I have the right to say that the Premier League is behind the Bundesliga, La Liga, Serie A and Ligue 1 at a tactical and technical level.

Of course those managers that you mentioned raise their level, but they are still behind the top 5 clubs in Europe, Real Madrid, Bayern, Barcelona, Juventus and Atletico Madrid, it is my opinion.

I just wanted to refute some simplistic analysis, like saying Pepe is a fraud because he lost a match, that is the tipycal behaviour of modern fans, maybe too much FM or FIFA.
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Ligue 1? Joke of a league
 
giorno said:
No, but from a purely tactical pov, you can't say he won the game. City did exactly what they wanted for an hour, and created more than enough chances to put the game away. Conte's tactics didn't work in stopping city, nor in helping chelsea create chances of their own. They won because city failed to kill the game, gave them a chance to get back and folded after chelsea took it.
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I can. Pep used his squad's strength in midfield well but didn't manage to get his strong forward line firing enough to score the goals to win. He also picked a near suicidal defensive lineup with better defenders in Sagna and Clichy on the bench.

Conte on the other hand had his team soaking up the pressure, despite his fairly shite defenders, and used his clinical forward line to great effect.

Tactical battle owned.
 
Nothing grates on me more than the "if X had scored, they'd have won" grips my shit. KDB didn't score, they lost. Nobody says if Hazard had scored when rounding the keeper it's 1-1 (or 1-0?) and potentially they go on to win it anyway. It is all about KdB lol

Every single game has hindsight, and a stackful of "if...." all irrelevant
 
Smashed them 1-3 on their own ground & got 2 of their 3 best players suspended for 3 games. Probably the best possible result imaginable for Conte & Chelsea.
 
I am astonished that some of their fans are still trying to claim Aguero's tackle was nowhere near as bad as made out, and had no intent behind it. !?!?!?!!
 
Still don't think Guardiola did anything groundbreaking in this game. He just targeted our obvious weakness in Alonso's lack of pace & Cahill's inability to defend properly. Matic's absence aided that tactic.



Overloading the right side is the same tactic Karanka used & I expect more teams to follow suit.


People talk like they utterly dominated us for the first 55 minutes when we were on top for 25-30 minutes & could've easily taken the lead 2 or 3 times before City took control.
 
BlueCelery said:
Still don't think Guardiola did anything groundbreaking in this game. He just targeted our obvious weakness in Alonso's lack of pace & Cahill's inability to defend properly. Matic's absence aided that tactic.



Overloading the right side is the same tactic Karanka used & I expect more teams to follow suit.


People talk like they utterly dominated us for the first 55 minutes when we were on top for 25-30 minutes & could've easily taken the lead 2 or 3 times before City took control.
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I only saw the highlights, but it did look like City should have smashed in 4 or so clear goals in those 60 mins. Annoyingly they didn't seem to show any of the Chelsea chances prior to then.
 
Pep's defensive set-up was ridiculous. Playing on the front foot is one thing, but that back three against Pedro, Costa and Hazard? Fair to say, City didn't have a back foot to fall back on.

He needs to be more pragmatic with this set of players, especially without possession. There's nobody in defence even close to the level of Lahm, Boateng, Alaba or Neuer.

At the moment, City start off in all-out mode and are mentally spent by 60 minutes. No wonder they concede goals in second halves.
 
VP89 said:
I only saw the highlights, but it did look like City should have smashed in 4 or so clear goals in those 60 mins. Annoyingly they didn't seem to show any of the Chelsea chances prior to then.
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Only de Bruyne's shot was a clear goal. Rest of the attempts (Aguero, de Bruyne, Gundogan) were all blocked as far as I remember.

In any case, Chelsea were set up to absorb pressure, deal with City's attacks and counter later on. People are saying the game would have been over at 2:0, I'm not so sure. Lot of players in that team, especially in defence, who don't have the mental stamina to play Pep's game for 90 minutes.
 
salford_ said:
If I was pep Joe Hart would be coming back next summer.
Or I'd sling millions Milan way and bring in Donnarumma
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They have Rulli coming in January I think, or next season. I don't remember, its a weird deal but he's looked impressive for Sociedad.
 
Shubham Ahuja said:
Only de Bruyne's shot was a clear goal. Rest of the attempts (Aguero, de Bruyne, Gundogan) were all blocked as far as I remember.

In any case, Chelsea were set up to absorb pressure, deal with City's attacks and counter later on. People are saying the game would have been over at 2:0, I'm not so sure. Lot of players in that team, especially in defence, who don't have the mental stamina to play Pep's game for 90 minutes.
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City created tons. De Bruyne also had the chance 1-v-1 with the keeper from the corner of the six yard box, Aguero had multiple shots on target from very good positions and should have buried at least one, they had a bunch of other pretty decent chances that just required a class finish. To have 2.6 xG and not score (the own goal isn't counted in these calculations) is very rare. And of course Chelsea had only 1.6 xG (the Hazard goal in injury time greatly contributing to that figure) and netted three.

CywkpIhXAAAWl1h.jpg:large


As a point of comparison, the 2.6 xG of City in that match is nearly as much as United had in the match against Stoke where you should have battered them.

CtyC2eEXEAAse45.jpg:large
 
Shubham Ahuja said:
Only de Bruyne's shot was a clear goal. Rest of the attempts (Aguero, de Bruyne, Gundogan) were all blocked as far as I remember.

In any case, Chelsea were set up to absorb pressure, deal with City's attacks and counter later on. People are saying the game would have been over at 2:0, I'm not so sure. Lot of players in that team, especially in defence, who don't have the mental stamina to play Pep's game for 90 minutes.
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Eh? There was far more clear chances than just that. One or two open headers, shots being saved off the line and such.

Chelsea rode their luck heavily in that fixture, there is little doubt about that.
 
How deeply surprising that Pep didn't get an FA charge despite sarcastically mocking the ref. Funny that considering Jose got charged once for simply saying a ref did a good job, and the FA deciding it was sarcasm.
 
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