@Manchester Dan Told you.
Within 3 games (Swansea, Celtic, Spurs), Guardiola has been matched and eventually bettered by teams with lesser players because when you get pressed properly and aggressively in midfield, your players fold.
They're not Barca, or even Bayern, and it was obvious that once teams really got at them they'd start faltering.
Thats not entirely true, we cut through Swansea numerous times and scored 3 times to their 1 so I'd say he was hardly bettered in that game, we just couldn't put them away till late much like Stoke, but till that point results were the same as West Ham and Sunderland none of whom really pressed us. The same Swansea who said we were the best team they've ever faced?
Celtics 3 goals came from 6 shots, one was offside, one a lucky deflection and the other a fantastic pass by Kolorov. I'll admit they did show great heart but we could have won that game 7 or 8-3. They had 6 shots on goal to our 19. 9 to 25 if you count blocked shots. Add to that Celtic have lost 3 times in 25 CL hope games despite their away woes and I'd say we bettered them too but like almost all our previous performances and the Swansea example just didn't kill them off again like West Ham, Sunderland and United.
The only teams we've actually put to bed this season without late goals are BMG and Bournemouth (CL qualifier aside), everything else has been a struggle to close out and we haven't killed games off like we should.
Of the 3 only Spurs and Poch bettered us and they played really well today, wanted it more, worked harder and were good value for their win. Everyone knows high pressing is a way to beat Pep but anything other than Spurs level today and we can cut teams apart. Liverpool will go that way too but expecting teams to do it at a high enough level to beat us regularly is next to impossible. Spurs have the perfect midfield to play that game and them being able to pull it off will be the exception rather than the rule. Its not just something teams can turn on our off either teams of lesser quality will work hard and try to implement whats Spurs did today but won't be able to do the job they did.
Spurs have been building a team based on high pressing and with all the physical attributes to do that for 2 years, Liverpool for just over a year, to expect others to do it to that level is asking alot of them.
In spite of Spurs dominating the game and being very deserving winners we still carved out 6 decent shooting chances 2nd half, one of which Aguero hit the post with, one he fluffed at the death, Iheanacho missed a soft one and than tripped over his feet. Spurs were out on their feet in the last 10-15 minutes but held firm with a super defensive performance when they tired, all credit to them but they had 10% less of the ball, one shot more (13-12) and one shot more on target (7-6) over the 90 odd minutes. Thats in a game we were dominated in.
As I said deserving winners and outplayed us but to say we folded from being pressed is way over the top. We were well beaten by one of the sides many predicted we would struggle against in a one off game, on the back of pummeling Celtic for 90 minutes only to hand them 3 goals, of which only the 2nd was down to their pressing.
We're not Barca or Bayern that I'll give you, not even close to those teams and I'd expect Barca will prove as much in the CL, but I'm pretty confident not many teams in England will be able to do what Spurs did today.
