Blasphemy!
Varchester City 18/19 discussion
- Thread starter Bergman
- Start date
-
In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik and Imran hold a long overdue conversation about United's awful league form with 1 win in 7. They discuss a disappointing draw at Bournemouth, a not so disappointing draw against Liverpool and a crushing defeat at Chelsea - Is time nearly over for Erik Ten Hag?
Then in a special second half of the pod, Nik welcomes Natalie ( https://twitter.com/natalie_17) to discuss the fortunes of Manchester United Women as they booked a place in the FA Cup Final after a historic first ever win vs. Chelsea.
On a plate by De Bruyne. If he doesn't score he is a liability. He constantly set up spurs counters.
It was a tough game for both teams for sure. Spurs' mettle up front was no surprise to me, I predicted it in another thread when Kane got injured (Son/Moura in great form - I'll bump that later). Lots of defensive mistakes though. And I mean lots.
Thanks for clearing that up.
City blew this big time. Spurs were to the bare bones.
City have to win on Saturday, who their season could be over in 3 days.
City have to win on Saturday, who their season could be over in 3 days.
You are right in everything except of that it was a terrific finish and that he had a very good game altogether.
Swap his defence with Liverpool’s and they would easily be through. Guardiola’s obsession with a team of ‘11 midfielders’ is bar far his biggest Achilles heel in Europe. This blind spot has cost him the European Cup every season since he left Barcelona.
I wonder if he’s just got a mental block over his defence or is stubborn to a fault?
I wonder if he’s just got a mental block over his defence or is stubborn to a fault?
He was trash all game. Watch his highlights. Los the ball on almost every single take on and allowed spurs to counter. He ball retention is one of the worst I've ever seen. Outside of the box he is subpar.
Guardiola blew it in the first game by playing an odd side. Mahrez should never have started and he played a midfield 3 that have barely played together and on the rare occasions that they have, they've been poor.
Glad you put the 'almost' in there at least, as he also had a nice assist. And could have easily had two, being offside in such a situation was all about luck.
This 1000%, for all the talk of him playing too may mf being too attacking, it was his pragmatic moment that blew up on us.
Playing 2 holding mf at WHL and then when going 4-2 up tonight switching to the exact same midfield trio, giving up the utter domination we had at that point allowed Spurs to control the ball and get back in the game. He then had to switch everything around again when bringing on Sane. I fully believe had he opted to keep his foot on Spurs throat instead of trying to be pragmatic we'd have scored again given how dominant we were.
Trying to be pragmatic is where he got it wrong in this tie.
Yep and really in the conext of it all the Aguero penalty was massive. Score that and I think Man. City win first leg 1-2 or 1-3 and tonight would've been largely academic.
Aguero is a brilliant player but he's not a great penalty taker under pressure imo. Stokes in them easy when his team are 3 or 4 up but he missed first leg and got very lucky to score in league cup final. Can't remember if he took one for Argentina in their two copa america shoot out losses.
Probably a bit bitter as he cost me over 500 quid when he missed a penalty v Barca in 2015.
It wasn't luck. Sterling was by his side before Ericksen played that ball but ran back onside. Aguero was just lazy. Simple.
City won't ever win the cl if that guy is their main striker. Cost them the tie.
Also cost them tie against Monaco when he missed sitter after sitter in the reurn leg. City should have been out of sight but as usual Aguero flops in Europe.
Hope tonight doesn't affect them for the rest of the season. They must stop Liverpool.
Not sure what you're getting at.
Shame to go out tonight. Very disappointed by Guardiola's tactics over the two legs really, overly defensive in the first leg and no away goal, and then absolutely wide open in the second leg when we didn't need to be.
Biggest issue for me is how we now recover mentally for the remainder of the season. We have six games left and we need to win all of them.
City fall again at the crucial hurdle. Spurs are a team they tend to sweep away with ease regularly in the league and spend far more than so there's no excuse for this result. At the end of the day, Guardiola is the one who has to introspect becuase as hard as it is to win the CL and not winning it is by no means a failture, for a club with City's resources, getting knocked out by a vastly inferior squad is extremely questionable.
And it's a consistent theme - Pep's teams in the CL knockout phases concede top many goals. Barcelona opened them up too easily. Liverpool tormented their defence. Spurs have scored 3 goals at their ground. They need to develop a certain level of grit and meanness if they want to go up a level in this competition. Hopefully Pep fecks off from City before that.
And it's a consistent theme - Pep's teams in the CL knockout phases concede top many goals. Barcelona opened them up too easily. Liverpool tormented their defence. Spurs have scored 3 goals at their ground. They need to develop a certain level of grit and meanness if they want to go up a level in this competition. Hopefully Pep fecks off from City before that.
Without by far and away their biggest goal threat
Time and time again some caftards never lean, every season some proclaim City as a favorite for the CL. Psychologically they're just not up for this prestigious competition. They scare no one in Europe
4 goals in 2 legs without him. This season Spurs have been good without Kane, when he came back from injury is when they started to lose all those points and fell of the title race
Guardiola's handling of Sane is a bit weird. He gets benched a lot for such an excellent player. Must be some issues in training etc.
Also Mendy is quite overrated.
Also Mendy is quite overrated.
Did Pep duck the post match presser ?
I don't really see City losing a game now, apart from (hopefully) the derby.
Pep is a perfectionist and I bet he's sharpened their minds now to concentrate on every game one by one.
Sane is not as good as the other wing options they have tbf.
He's comfortably better than Mahrez.
It’s funny. Having seen Pep crumble against good teams over and over again there’s a clear pattern in all of them. The reason his teams are insanely efficient at demolishing smaller teams is because he is very talented at coaching a devastatingly attacking team using their maximal potential technical ability. He doesn’t have to fuss with tactics or individual player selections too much because the juggernaut usually doesn’t care. They have almost machine like patterns of attacking play, with the most distinct one we know is the 3 player co-ordinated off the ball triangle they play in the opposition fullback channel that almost always results in a square ball tap in.
In big games he shits the bed at the thought that the opposition might actually have the quality to take their 1-3 chances in the game. Instead of ignoring that fear he instead seems to shoot himself in the foot and fidget with the tactics too much to try and nullify them rather than just letting his team do what he’s coached them all season to do.
It’s a very odd characteristic of him that is continually becoming his short coming. With Barcelona it didn’t matter because you could have played 9 players on the field and Xavi/Iniesta/Busquets/Messi don’t care.
In big games he shits the bed at the thought that the opposition might actually have the quality to take their 1-3 chances in the game. Instead of ignoring that fear he instead seems to shoot himself in the foot and fidget with the tactics too much to try and nullify them rather than just letting his team do what he’s coached them all season to do.
It’s a very odd characteristic of him that is continually becoming his short coming. With Barcelona it didn’t matter because you could have played 9 players on the field and Xavi/Iniesta/Busquets/Messi don’t care.
Read somewhere that City has conceded 19 goals in 6 knockout matches they've played under Pep. Horrible record and it's quite a bit flaw in Pep's tactics. It's a recurring thing so can't be called a fluke.
This. It happens every year, they're called biggest favorites and supposedly wpuld swallow every opponent.
Same as Sanchez. Sane likes to go it alone at times and create on the dribble. Pep isn’t having that.
That said, Bernardo Silva is ridiculously good on the right for them. But him buying Mahrez never mind prefering him is pure madness as Mahrez is just a shitter version of Sane.
His naivety is on display about this time every year. No Fernandinho today was baffling.
Going forward they are something special, amaizing attacking machine.
They failed because of uncharacteristic mistakes of their best striker who missed a pen in the 1st leg and their best defender who played like a pub CB in the 2nd tie. It's more on the players than Guardiola. That said, the quadruple chase forced them to rest players in the 1st leg which came to bite them in the arse. This one was on Guardiola.
It's not true that they are build to demolish smaller teams and struggle against better teams. Their league record against the top 6 over the last 2 seasons is exceptional. It is better than Liverpool's, including their defensive record. If they lose the title, it would be because of results against teams outside the top 6. Liverpool have been more efficient in beating them this season.
They failed because of uncharacteristic mistakes of their best striker who missed a pen in the 1st leg and their best defender who played like a pub CB in the 2nd tie. It's more on the players than Guardiola. That said, the quadruple chase forced them to rest players in the 1st leg which came to bite them in the arse. This one was on Guardiola.
It's not true that they are build to demolish smaller teams and struggle against better teams. Their league record against the top 6 over the last 2 seasons is exceptional. It is better than Liverpool's, including their defensive record. If they lose the title, it would be because of results against teams outside the top 6. Liverpool have been more efficient in beating them this season.
They'll probably end up spending another £2-300 million this summer.
Not exactly a specific guess.
Sane mainly plays on the left doesn't he? Not sure it's Mahrez he's competing with.
At least they’ll put all their attention on the league now
To be conceding 3 goals at home in Europe considering how much they spent on their defence is joke ting
City 5-3 Monaco, Monaco 3-1 City
Basel 0-4 City, City 1-2 Basel
Liverpool 3-0 City, City 1-2 Liverpool
Schalke 2-3 City, City 7-0 Schalke
Spurs 1-0 City, City 4-3 Spurs
19 goals conceded in 10 games, almost 2 goals a game. It's also pretty ridiculous how easy their draws have been. It helps that they usually win their groups and are in pot 1, but to avoid the likes of Barca, Madrid, Juve, Bayern and PSG in the knockouts is pretty lucky.
Maybe that’s it. First thought was that he’d played fair few matches as an inverted winger, but maybe he hasn’t actually.
Pellegrini at least made it to the semi finals. Somebody call Messi, Fraud cannot do it without him it seems.
And they had to face PSG, Madrid and Juve (in the groups). The best teams Pep has had to face in the groups were Barca in 16/17 and Napoli in 17/18.
Also Pellegrini's City went out to RM and Barca iirc, think it was Barca twice. Meanwhile, Fraudiola went out to what, Monaco, Liverpool and now a fecking Tottenham? Give me a break.
Sorry my bad I got the stats wrong then. It's still a bad record given they started every tie(perhaps apart from the Pool) one as overwhelming favorites.
It is poor. Take out that Schalke home game and their GD for those results is exactly 0.