Manchester City 17/18 discussion | "If you're here for the Champions clap your hands" (#6505)

Not really. City are a 'super club' this season so far, but it was Chelsea last season, Leicester before that. Serie A is getting much more competitive now too, four teams battling for the title race and all capable of winning it.
Nah, none of those sides were super clubs. Super clubs are the sort that dominate their league competitors and are tipped to be up for the CL.

Exactly, those teams would have nothing to fear from the other sides in the EPL but would find it tough going vs City.
 
Old interview prior to the derby but interesting on his comments about the differences in leagues, citing the Premiership as being more defensive than others he played/coached in
 
That is over exaggeration. Like I said they have scored counter attacking goals, the one against Napoli was brilliant. Even Barca score many counter attacking goals but the football primarily they play is possession based with pass-pass football. Again nothing wrong with that, it has its charm but for me I like managers to mix it up.

Even Jose's team in some matches have loads of possession but does that mean his philosophy is that. Before you start writing your own narratives like me hating any form of possession let me clarify Jose's football this season has not been better than Pep's. Just that I always like managers to mix it up. I enjoyed Germany in 2010 WC more than Spain. I personally found them boring. Keeping possession for the sake of it well is not my cup of tea. I blame van gaal for that.

This is why I said no one particular style is perfect. Barca fans love possession based football which is understandable but that does not mean others have to follow that or that is what everyone should automatically like. The beauty of football is the way there are different styles.
Well tbh, Van Gaal's philosophy, Spain's WC winning side and Pep's City are not even alike apart from the fact that their primary objective is to keep the ball. You are generalizing way too much here, Pep's team doesn't keep possession 'for the sake of it' unless he's trying to see out the game at the end.
 
Talks of VVD in January, I say go for it. Kompany is not to be relied anymore and Stones has already missed a huge chunk of the league due to getting overplayed. I like VVD and he'll fit Pep's system like a glove, also he's excellent in the air which is always a plus.
 
Talks of VVD in January, I say go for it. Kompany is not to be relied anymore and Stones has already missed a huge chunk of the league due to getting overplayed. I like VVD and he'll fit Pep's system like a glove, also he's excellent in the air which is always a plus.
Not for £70m though.
 
Talks of VVD in January, I say go for it.

Didn't he snub us last season & state he wanted to go to Liverpool. I'm sure we'd have offered a bigger transfer fee & higher wage, yet he still didn't want to come.

Not sure of the reasons for this. It may be that he'd prefer to work under Klopp rather than Pep.

We saw how a transfer like this worked out for Utd with Di Maria. If his preferred destination is Liverpool then i'd rather we let him go there.
 
City are apparently about to buy a 50% stake in Belgian team KV Oostende. The club would become part of their group of teams including New York, Melbourne, Girona.

The club has been for sale as the owner has actually bought RSC Anderlecht this week and of course it's illegal to have 2 teams in the same competition.

Swapping one team as an owner to the next one. Only in Belgium...
 
Certaintly seems like a weird purchase, Marc Coucke (the new owner of RSC) had a lot of competitors for buying that club while you'd think he wouldn't be so easily able to get a premium price for Oostende. But then Marc Coucke is a excentric billionaire that hardly has to care about the millions, and the rumour goes that he did it in part for a friend (Ide) who wanted to get back to one of the other candidate's to buy RSC (Gheysens, who is also owner of Royal Antwerp FC) over a previous spat regarding the land around a farm estate, Ide owned that farm estate and had wished to buy an extra 30 hectare of land around but Gheysens had bought it up before his nose just to annoy him. Coucke himself also had an account to settle with Gheysens after it had appeared that when he and an associate had bought up an appartment block for renovation, Gheysens owned 2 flats in it and had demanded a 50% share of the pie.

http://www.gva.be/cnt/dmf20171222_0...hoe-alles-begon-met-een-ruzie-over-deze-hoeve

http://derijkstebelgen.be/nieuws/de-vijanden-van-paul-gheysens-deel-ii/
 
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Amazing really, I actually have never heard of any player coming out of South America that didn't have a struggling childhood

Kaka, I think had a pretty affluent family.
 
Excerpt from a Telegraph article on Ederson
An interesting point in that article is that it states he doesn’t speak English.

Understandable as he’s only been here 5 months, but presumably knows the basics of saying left/right/keeper etc.

Pep iirc made the (entirely no brainer) decision that all training takes place in English despite Kidd being the only English coach.
- so I presume he’ll have an English tutor and be expected to get too a certain level by a certain date.
 
Kaka, I think had a pretty affluent family.
A good number of white brazilians come from rich families. Pretty much everyone else comes from poverty(football is very much a working class sport and the working class greatly outnumbers the upper and middle classes in SA. Brazil didn't even really have a middle class until about a decade ago...). For argies, there was also their country's financial collapse at the turn of the millenium...
 
Currently one of the most dominant PL teams I can remember. If they continue like this all season they will be one of (if not the) greatest PL teams. 60 goals already is insane, especially when combined with the joint fewest goals conceded.

fecking pricks.
 
So, they just broke a couple of points records. With 55 after 19 games, they have the highest points tally at the midway point of a PL season (until this season a record held by Chelsea in 2005/06). Also highest point total on Christmas Day, beating United's 1993 record of 52*.

*Not quite like-for-like, the 1993-94 season still had a 22-team Premier League so we'd played 21 games by that point.
 
Currently one of the most dominant PL teams I can remember. If they continue like this all season they will be one of (if not the) greatest PL teams. 60 goals already is insane, especially when combined with the joint fewest goals conceded.

fecking pricks.

1. They're halfway through a season.

2. This City side have won no previous silverware.

3. They will need to win multiple PLs to be even considered as 'the greatest PL team'.
 
Currently one of the most dominant PL teams I can remember. If they continue like this all season they will be one of (if not the) greatest PL teams. 60 goals already is insane, especially when combined with the joint fewest goals conceded.

fecking pricks.

Have to retain a title to be even near that conversation
 
Well tbh, Van Gaal's philosophy, Spain's WC winning side and Pep's City are not even alike apart from the fact that their primary objective is to keep the ball. You are generalizing way too much here, Pep's team doesn't keep possession 'for the sake of it' unless he's trying to see out the game at the end.

The only difference they have is one team waiting for opening and the other is just cluelessly keeping the ball not knowing what to do with it.

Same philosophy perhaps, but pep has the firepower to finish teams. Ours is a blunt plastic knife
 
1. They're halfway through a season.

2. This City side have won no previous silverware.

3. They will need to win multiple PLs to be even considered as 'the greatest PL team'.
Have to retain a title to be even near that conversation

I did say "if they continue like this all season". That's a big if.

Anyway, I'm talking about single season teams. If they finish the way they've started they will have had arguably the single best PL winning season.
 
Another disappointing week end already with this City victory, dang. And I don't think Newcastle can get something out on boxing day.
 
Christmas is ruined.
 
Excerpt from a Telegraph article on Ederson

Hi, please don't post full articles from Times or Telegraph or any of the paywalled newsites really. The Caf has received notices from these type of sites before.
 
Amazing really, I actually have never heard of any player coming out of South America that didn't have a struggling childhood

Zabaleta, quite surprisingly, came from a fairly well-off family, I believe, at least compared to someone like Tevez, anyway.
 
IF City actually do not win anything this season there are going to be a helluva lot of people in the media and in general with a world of egg on their faces and deservedly so,Nothing is won by Christmas and IF they suddenly have a serious injury crisis then anything can happen,its a funny old game and not over until the fat lady sings.

On a personal note City actually remind me of the Chav from the council estate who won the lottery then proceeded to rub everyones noses in it by driving around in a shiny new Lamborghini when previously they ran a ford fiesta....
 
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Lucky City again. Things are starting to make sense with the doping thing coming out though.
 
IF City actually do not win anything this season there are going to be a helluva lot of people in the media and in general with a world of egg on their faces and deservedly so,Nothing is won by Christmas and IF they suddenly have a serious injury crisis then anything can happen,its a funny old game and not over until the fat lady sings.

On a personal note City actually remind me of the Chav from the council estate who won the lottery then proceeded to rub everyones noses in it by driving around in a shiny new Lamborghini when previously they ran a ford fiesta....
Let's not dream too much here, they have instilled the right psychological state in their opponents' minds... Yes, an injury crisis, maybe. It's a big maybe at this point and I don't think betting companies would think like that.
 
You have to wonder where Sanchez will fit in that team?
 
You have to wonder where Sanchez will fit in that team?
Either in place of Aguero, or, more likely Sterling. Hopefully that bites them in the backside as Sterling has been one of their better players while Sanchez just hasn't looked arsed at Arsenal this season.
 
Well, one thing is certain. Better this way than that feckin Aguero last-minute winner.

See, you can always find positive.
 
You have to wonder where Sanchez will fit in that team?

More or less think that Aguero is out and Jesus isn't that impressive right now. Sanchez when motivated would be class in this lineup.
 
Either in place of Aguero, or, more likely Sterling. Hopefully that bites them in the backside as Sterling has been one of their better players while Sanchez just hasn't looked arsed at Arsenal this season.
Absolutely and that's my point. Why would any manager replace Sterling, who's got 12 goals and 4 assists in 17 games (not sure if the stats are updated with his goal today) with a player that has currently 5 goals and 3 assists?
 
More or less think that Aguero is out and Jesus isn't that impressive right now. Sanchez when motivated would be class in this lineup.

Ahead of the departing Aguero
Maybe. But tbh I have never classed Sanchez as a striker. Saying that we all know how Pep likes to play with false 9's, so you could be right.
 
Either in place of Aguero, or, more likely Sterling. Hopefully that bites them in the backside as Sterling has been one of their better players while Sanchez just hasn't looked arsed at Arsenal this season.

If we get Sanchez I imagine it will be at the expense of Aguero, unfortunately. Pretty certain we won't move for him in January too.
 
If we get Sanchez I imagine it will be at the expense of Aguero, unfortunately. Pretty certain we won't move for him in January too.
I'd be amazed if you didn't. Not CL tied, and Arsenal will want some money. I think it will happen in January.