Yes he did. Pretty much all the players I predicted would eventually be out of the squad were spot on except for Yaya which was always going to be a battle but it's Kun that is probably disappointing Pep more than anyone. They just lack goalscorers for the moment, De Bruyne providing lovely opportunities for both Sterling & Dilva shows you how football is down to making the most of our chances. Defensively, everyone knew a lot of changes were always in order - the fullbacks along is begging for changes
Is it Guardiola or is it his City squad?
- Thread starter Gandalf Greyhame
- Start date
I blame pep. Even if it's aging they still have a good squad.
Pep as a supposedly talented manager should be able to get the best out of his current players.
Pep as a supposedly talented manager should be able to get the best out of his current players.
Pep is unable to handle it. He is used to his teams winning 80% of the matches by default.
Well, it remains to be seen whether he can handle his first real challenging job or he ll take the Di Maria route soon.
is he the highest paid manager btw?
Well, it remains to be seen whether he can handle his first real challenging job or he ll take the Di Maria route soon.
is he the highest paid manager btw?
I think there needs to be gradations between 'he is that good' and 'he was never that good'.
I think he is a sublimely talented manager who has underestimated the circumstances he finds himself in, both in terms of the ability of the squad to implement his tactics and the suitability of those tactics to the league and has a new learning curve ahead of him.
It'll be interesting to see how city look next season. I imagine they will be a vastly different prospect.
I think he is a sublimely talented manager who has underestimated the circumstances he finds himself in, both in terms of the ability of the squad to implement his tactics and the suitability of those tactics to the league and has a new learning curve ahead of him.
It'll be interesting to see how city look next season. I imagine they will be a vastly different prospect.
That's a fair point. This is the fist time he's had to build a team without having the players to hand.
As I said above, that's the biggest test for me. The system works, but he needs to either develop what he has or buy in.
When you have a big squad full of quality players and a blank cheque. I would certainly be looking at the manager
If a club sign Guardiola is to play like Barcelona or at least to implement an style from the base, not to adapt and start playing like the rest.
They had a very good beginning of the season so perhaps the ideas and the squad are fine but the problem is elsewhere.
I would like to know what level of confidence the City owners feel for Pep,if they are aware that the change can be long and how far he will be able to modify the squad.
In Germany he got Xabi Alonso and Thiago and I think that soon he will start bringing midfielders from la liga, to find some tactical complicity as I think he had with Alonso.
On the other hand if a team with that squad(even if it's not his favorite) lose 4-2 or 4-0 is because the manager is not doing the things well,defensive concepts,motivation,etc.
They had a very good beginning of the season so perhaps the ideas and the squad are fine but the problem is elsewhere.
I would like to know what level of confidence the City owners feel for Pep,if they are aware that the change can be long and how far he will be able to modify the squad.
In Germany he got Xabi Alonso and Thiago and I think that soon he will start bringing midfielders from la liga, to find some tactical complicity as I think he had with Alonso.
On the other hand if a team with that squad(even if it's not his favorite) lose 4-2 or 4-0 is because the manager is not doing the things well,defensive concepts,motivation,etc.
There is a big problem with City, people overrate their roster all the time and completely ignore their actual capabilities. I have always thought that people were very harsh with Pellegrini.
PS: If United had their roster I would cry myself to sleep.
PS: If United had their roster I would cry myself to sleep.
City fans believed they had the best manager and the best squad. They had a blistering start to the season...then the wheels fell off. They spent more money than any other team this season. I don't care what the issue is but long may it continue. After so much hype and expectation and the media fanfare when Pep rolled into town, about to sweep all before him, it's laughable how things are turning out. Where do City go from here?
The guy is cracking up.
Funny how the City fans on my Facebook are actually talking about their own team for once all of a sudden.
Funny how the City fans on my Facebook are actually talking about their own team for once all of a sudden.
I'm going to steal for future discussions.
That;s the thing, isn't it? To execute that idea to perfection, he needs too much. Only Barca/Bayern/PsG can provide him with such fine-tuned players and league conditions. Also, there is no guarantee that his system is going to work long-run, at City. Don't you think he will suffer if he doesn't adapt?
I tend to agree with this. I think it's Guardiola, at this point, more than his squad. He has, at the very least, made mistakes he needs to quickly rectify before it's too late.
City have been doing for quite a few seasons, now. He spent 150m this window alone, getting in players of his choice and kicking out the likes of Hart (who, you could say, has at least the right mentality). I don't think him throwing money at the problem will solve it. Like others have pointed out already, their transfers haven't worked out well. I don't think that the new players themselves are bad (I'm sure the likes of Klopp and Mourinho could make Otamendi and Fernando look world-class on a weekly basis), it's just that they don't fit into the system, and that is on the manager.
This is another thing. For all of Pep's reputation of playing with kids, he hasn't really given youngsters too much of a chance. Their under 18-s are topping the table, and they have some exciting players like Celina(their EDS player of the year), Man Utd Garcia, Enes Unal, Brandon Barker - but they never seem to be given a chance, too. These players can't be worse than Lingard, can they? Why don't they get a chance?
This is not hard to imagine, maybe he just needs time.
A bit of both, but given he's spent nigh on 200million he should have improved their defense and midfield and he hasn't. A fit Gundoghan improves their midfield but not a Gundoghan who's out for 6-12months as everyone knew was likely at some stage. Stones was the most error prone defender in the league and he signed him knowing that. Bravo is a worse goalkeeper. Sane, Nolito and Gabriel Jesus were nowhere near as important as strengthening the midfield and defense. Did he not know that because I did. He could have signed Kante, Mustafi and Raphael Guerreiro instead of those 3, kept Nasri and they'd be so much more solid.
Now attempting to play possession football with that midfield and defense is suicidal. Given their forwards are so much more creative and skillful than their midfielders the logical tactic would be to transition far quicker.
Now attempting to play possession football with that midfield and defense is suicidal. Given their forwards are so much more creative and skillful than their midfielders the logical tactic would be to transition far quicker.
Why do you think their roster is so poor? They have quality players in every department, and the depth for it. I'll quote myself from August ( rival squad thread):
Spending 74m on Stones and Bravo really helped.
I don't rate half of their best team either because they are never fit or because they are wank.
Here are the players I rate Silva, De Bruyne, Fernandinho and Aguero. I would add Kompany and Gundogan but they are never fit.
Regardless of the standard of squad Pep has inherited prior to City it still takes a lot of man management, motivation and mutual respect to guide teams to so many trophies. With the right tools at his command he will do well. No doubt he has been extremely lucky in the level of team he has walked into but its nonsense to think that just about anyone would win the number of trophies that Pep did.
I think this has been a wake up call for him and he will rightly be judged on whether he can overhaul the City squad and make them as dominant as Barcelona and Bayern were. I don't see him dominating in England. There's 6 teams vying for a place in the top 4 and have considerable money at their disposal and top class managers at the helm.
I think this has been a wake up call for him and he will rightly be judged on whether he can overhaul the City squad and make them as dominant as Barcelona and Bayern were. I don't see him dominating in England. There's 6 teams vying for a place in the top 4 and have considerable money at their disposal and top class managers at the helm.
City's transfer dealings over the last 3-4 years have been so so poor. Pep's not doing a good job at all, obviously. But a lot of the problems are inherited from previous managers and seem to be down to the players. City always lacked consistency. Even in their title winning seasons they went on good and bad runs rather than actually winning points consistently with a few single bad games inbetween. It's so weird and in my opinion a big mental problem that needs fixing before Pep will have real success there.
Rebuilding the central midfield with quality and reliable player should have been the first step. You need a strong core for consistency and City never had that in the middle. They totally fecked that up in the summer, when they only signed a midfielder who's more injured than fit.
I did expect Pep to fix the mentality of the team, but it's no surprise that he really hasn't considering he's again relying on Yaya in midfield and their central defensive core is simply a bit shit.
I wouldn't be surprised if they soon go on a great run again though. It's what City have always done in recent years with these players. They really should try to add another reliable CM in January and then hope that they'll improve once Fernandinho is back from his suspension.
Rebuilding the central midfield with quality and reliable player should have been the first step. You need a strong core for consistency and City never had that in the middle. They totally fecked that up in the summer, when they only signed a midfielder who's more injured than fit.
I did expect Pep to fix the mentality of the team, but it's no surprise that he really hasn't considering he's again relying on Yaya in midfield and their central defensive core is simply a bit shit.
I wouldn't be surprised if they soon go on a great run again though. It's what City have always done in recent years with these players. They really should try to add another reliable CM in January and then hope that they'll improve once Fernandinho is back from his suspension.
Stones hasn't been the issue, the issues is Bravo and the forwards not taking chances, yesterday was the 7th time this season the oppo scored with their first shot on target, the oppo have also scored something like 15 goals from the last 22 on target, Bravo just can't appear to save a shot and although Hart had plenty of goalkeeping weaknesses he would have IMO saved at least 2 of those goals yesterday.
First half yesterday we should have been at least 2 up by the time Everton scored, same with Chelsea, and the home games against Soton and Boro, we're playing far better than last season and the only worry I've got on this season is he perseveres with Bravo as although he may be a decent keeper (I dunno I don't watch much Spanish football) he's struggling in the prem and with the aging defence.
Also to be fair to Guardiola after about 8 or 9 game he even said we would struggle to win the league with the way we were playing, he had already seen the issues now he has to make sure he can plug the gaps. A left back is a must.
First half yesterday we should have been at least 2 up by the time Everton scored, same with Chelsea, and the home games against Soton and Boro, we're playing far better than last season and the only worry I've got on this season is he perseveres with Bravo as although he may be a decent keeper (I dunno I don't watch much Spanish football) he's struggling in the prem and with the aging defence.
Also to be fair to Guardiola after about 8 or 9 game he even said we would struggle to win the league with the way we were playing, he had already seen the issues now he has to make sure he can plug the gaps. A left back is a must.
That's a specific problem in Pep's tactics though. Always has been that way. Teams create few chances but they're always high quality ones. The defenders and the goalkeeper need to cover so much ground against counterattacks that they'll always get easily exposed if the rest of the team is careless in possession and gives away the ball in situations where the opposing team can break quickly.
It was the same at Barca and Bayern, the players just gave away way less of these type of chances. Obviously Bravo should do a lot better, but it's crazy difficult for a goalkeeper to have a high save/shots on target ratio if the majority of shots at him come from dangerous positions in counterattacks. It's much easier for a goalkeeper to save lots of shots, if the defense sits deep and forces the opponent to take shots from bad positions/long range. That doesn't mean that it's the wrong way of playing the game though, the team just needs to reduce the number of counterattacks they allow to happen rather. In the end, that's the way to defensive stability in Pep's tactics, much more than actually improving the defending of situations that are most of the time just insanely difficult to defend.
I hear people in Madrid have started calling him Fraudiola.
Like Ogden said on twitter it's difficult to find any players that Pep has improved this season, maybe at a push Sterling but that's more about his regaining his confidence and returning to his pre-City levels. Mourinho, Conte, Klopp and Pochettino have all improved players in their respective squads.
you're not going to really improve players like Kolarov, Yaya, Silva, Clichy, Sagna, Zabaletta etc who make up the bulk of the team in their twilight years, it's bonkers, we're miles better than we were last season for the most part.
He needs two or 3 windows, people(the media) are obsessed with success now and it doesn't happen like that, performance wise were so far ahead of the rubbish Pelligrini servered up in his last 18 months, just needs a couple of tweaks. A new left back is a must, we haven't spent a penny on full backs since 2011 and it shows.
oh, and Ogdon is a bloody idiot
So why did Pep spend 150mn in the summer? What did he improve exactly in the squad? He splurged 80 mn on Stones and Bravo too. And how are you miles better than last season? And why does Pep need 2-3 windows when Conte is doing it after 1 window alone.
What if he fails to get the top 4?
I think that's one of the areas that's causing the most bemusement amongst United fans. Most of us actually had a certain grudging respect for the way City seemed to be preparing for Guardiola. The appointment of Txiki Begiristain as DoF. It all seemed to be a master plan. Even down to appointing Pellegrini, who wasn't going to kick up a fuss when ditched (even when it was announced mid-season).
They spent £180m this season, and the same the season before. On the face of it, all done with a strategy in mind and Guardiola's style well known. That's what makes the idea that they still seem to need a serious injection of money/players that much more entertaining.
They'll sack Begiristain for bad transfer deals.
Txiki's work in the transfermarket is highly questionable though and most of his high profile signings didn't really fit with Guardiola's style of play, certainly not before this summer. They were simply hyped up young players and City overpaid massively. The whole holistic approach thing with players carefully chosen for the longterm with Pep in mind never made much sense if you pay 50m for Mangala. Or if you buy someone like De Bruyne as your future key attacker who is a totally different type of number 10 compared to anything Pep ever had in his teams, much more direct with his strengths not necessarily suited to a cautious possession side.
@padr81 @Gentleman Jim @M18CTID
Which players would you like to see brought into the squad and which have you been linked with?
Which players would you like to see brought into the squad and which have you been linked with?
I don't think he'll have the staying power to do that - unless things pick up in the league between now and the end of the season, or they win the CL, he'll probably be off in the summer
I don't think you're miles better at all. I think performance wise and results you're equal to last season. At the start of last season you started equally as well results wise, your first five games you didn't concede a single goal (beating Everton 2-0 away in the process). You might have played some sublime football at the start of the season but I don't think we'll see that man city again this season, and certainly not for a sustained period. I'd be willing to bet you'll finish around 6th and miss out on a CL spot.
I think at the start of the season Pep had an aura about him that made the city players believe in that his methods would work and make them into the a Barca-esque team. His naivety towards the league has shown through now. Statements that the league is the same intensity as La Liga and the German league simply aren't true. If only for the fact that there's no winter break, which increases the "intensity" via a lack of rest that he simply isn't accustomed to.
Secondly in his previous two clubs he could be guaranteed to roll over 95% of teams in the league with the team playing at 80% of its capacity. In the premiership if his team aren't playing at 95% of their ability then they're likely to get a draw, or even lose to the likes of Stoke. This is totally alien to pep and I think it's going to test his ability to mentally motivate his players. I'm not sure motivating is one of his strong points, he doesn't seem a mentally strong individually himself. I'm basing this on the fact he seems to need to take breaks from football and stated that he struggles to motivate a team after 4 or so seasons. These seem like the words of someone who is rather fragile, his demeanour and press conferences when things are going badly only serve to reinforce this.
His players maybe aren't of the required mental/technical profile that would be required to pull off his possession based game plan. If you look at the line-up in the Everton game the defence on paper, is an absolute calamity waiting to happen where as the attack and midfield looks like some of the best in the league. But if his base isn't strong then City are going to continue to lose games against teams they should be blowing away. Looking at that defence, it's going to take at the very least a couple of transfer windows to fix and if Pep insists on signing supposedly "ball-playing centre backs" in the mold of stones, over players that are foremost superb defenders then I think he's always going to struggle in the premier league.
It's Pep. Most people if not everyone knew this would be his toughest Job. He's been wrong about a lot of things. I'm glad we didn't get him
DB aside, the 'big players' that have driven their success so far are all starting end of career declines, some more gradually than others, in particular Aguero looks a yard of pace short, and it makes all the difference in our league with well drilled defences.
On top of that, guardiola simply underestimated the challenge that most of the teams in the league can present. It is unlike any other league in europe in that respect, and he appears to have very little in the way of answer to it.
Edit:
Guardiola deserves all the criticism in the world for his trandfer policy regardless of anything else. Id Moyes, Van Gaal, Mourinho or even wenger had spent 50 million on stones and he then went on to perform like he did yesterday they would be crucified for it. Rightly so. He bought a dud, he did the same with the goalie, hart is not brilliant, but he would stop two of them yesterday for sure. pep is just not as good as the hype.
On top of that, guardiola simply underestimated the challenge that most of the teams in the league can present. It is unlike any other league in europe in that respect, and he appears to have very little in the way of answer to it.
Edit:
Guardiola deserves all the criticism in the world for his trandfer policy regardless of anything else. Id Moyes, Van Gaal, Mourinho or even wenger had spent 50 million on stones and he then went on to perform like he did yesterday they would be crucified for it. Rightly so. He bought a dud, he did the same with the goalie, hart is not brilliant, but he would stop two of them yesterday for sure. pep is just not as good as the hype.
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Its interesting, I was going to disagree based on how it seems to me, but then when I actually looked at your results I was surprised at how bad they were last season. Looking at the stats, seems the main difference is that the league around you has improved so much this year.
This time last season you had 40 points and GD of +18. That put you 3rd place, 3 points off the top, 5 points clear in the race for the top 4 and with the best goal diff in the league.
Now you have 42 points and GD of +15. But that only puts you 5th place, 10 points off the top, 2 points behind 4th place and a goal diff of between 10 and 15 worse than the top 4.
So despite having more points, you go from well in contention to being, frankly, nowhere near the top. Pretty mad.
MILES better I tell you.
Indeed, I should have clarified that. My memory told me City were quite good last season, but actually they were just as bad. Fairer to say they've gone sideways, but the relative expectations on Pellegrini vs Pep makes it a bigger disappointment this year.
Sounds like an ideologue who can't get his head around imperfect players, who don't always perform optimally.
Being completely honest we have been linked with any leaders so atm I'd take a fit kompany for the reasons I posted earlier and a new keeper. Having to play Yaya dm is a consequence of fern1 being banned and fern2 being injured. I'd also like to see garcia given a run in midfield where zabs is playing.
I don't think money will improve us to be honest unless some wc players become available. we need kompany like we have done past 2 seasons. Purely because we're rudderless without him.
This season was always going to be difficult. Too many aging players sitting on the last year of their contracts.
However, these contracts will be finished come the summer freeing up substantial room on the wage bill. Expect big squad changes.
I didn't expect too much this season and Pep kept telling us during the 10 match opening victory sequence at the start of the season that it wasn't real.
Just want to get this season over and move on to the Pep revolution.
However, these contracts will be finished come the summer freeing up substantial room on the wage bill. Expect big squad changes.
I didn't expect too much this season and Pep kept telling us during the 10 match opening victory sequence at the start of the season that it wasn't real.
Just want to get this season over and move on to the Pep revolution.
Agreed, I'll also leave this with you and especially with @Thunderhead:
Since the beginning of October, Manchester City sit seventh in a Premier League table. They have collected one fewer point than Stoke City, and two more than West Ham.
Since the beginning of the season we sit 5th in the premier league and United 6th. People make this out to be a crisis but we've 5W 2L from our last 7. Liverpool who by comparison are on "good" form, are 3 pts ahead of us (deservedly) but their last 7 games are 3w 3d 1l, Arsenal have 4W, 1D, 2L. Granted the manner of our defeat yesterday was embarrassing but we're not in as bad a form as people make out. If we don't beat Spurs next week I imagine we'll be playing catch up with a mentally weak squad but if we do we could then win 6 or 7 in a row as we have been prone to do for the last 3 seasons.
We are where we are on merit and we'll finish where we finish on merit. Yesteday was the first signs of us giving up and not showing the fight we have in other games under Pep which is a worry but that aside, we're not exactly in the crisis the media and other try to say we are.