They put both their main strikers, one of the starting center backs, started Gundogan instead of KDB on midfield and played B. Silva upfront. You seriously cant deny this points to them having bigger fish to fry. It was pretty much a dead rubber to them. The likes of KDB and Aguero were turned to just to salvage derby pride and their unbeaten home record. But their real focus was last night. And Spurs will feel the full fury of the pain of last night's exit. I'm close to certain about that
Manchester City under Pep Guardiola | Pep on City v Liverpool ref: "He likes to be special"
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik (@Rood) is joined by CEO Duncan Drasdo and Financial Director Andy Green from the Manchester United Supporters Trust for a special episode on all things behind the scenes at Old Trafford including a brief history of MUST and their aims today, views on INEOS and Sir Jim Ratcliffe so far, and the Old Trafford regeneration.
David Silva, Aguero are part of their attack. Aguero is the striker who played most mins, Silva is the attacking mid who played second most mins after KdB.
On the right though, no? He rarely plays on the left. Or maybe Pep just rates Delph higher.
Agreed. The fear that Jose could somehow catch them forced them to play their strongest available team too often. It was probably irrational but it would have been a colossal feckup to lose the league from the position in which they were in December. Another thing is that they wanted to win the league while breaking all records and it cost them a lot. When Barca and Madrid broke the records for most points in La Liga, they failed in the CL. It's one or the other. To win the CL while breaking multiple league records would take a superhuman team, arguably the greatest ever. This one is far from it.
It wasn't dead rubber to them. If it was, 7 players wouldn't have played against ManUtd. They would have rested whole 11. It wasn't as important as their game vs Liverpool but no way it was dead rubber.
For me his constant mistake was to insist on dominating the ball and passing out from the back vs Klopp. The best way to beat Klopp is to give him more of the ball and to not engage in passing the ball around in defence too much. At Bayern he one hammered Klopp by doing just that. Giving him more of the ball and targeting his fullback a with switch balls to the flank or the keeper directly feeding the holding midfielder to start moves. I'll never know why he didn't bother to do the same over these two legs. Or maybe his previous two results had deceived him that his default style of play could survive what Klopp throws at him.
I'm talkng only about the forwards. It's Aguero and the other three (or 4 if Bernardo is counted as a forward as well). It's a pretty young line and it did well at SB and OT earlier in the season. But it is inexperienced.
Dude. They rested most of the spine of the team. Any team that does that is indicating the match at hand isn't a major priority, even if they still started 7 of their usual XI. There is no way in hell they wanted to win that game as badly as last night's game and we took full advantage of their divided priority. They wanted to win the derby but it was a free hit. People are trying to paint the three losses as some kind of "proof' of either a physical or mental break down for City when it couldn't be further from the case. I fully expect their next game to bear this out.
Not sure about that. You can't change the tactics for one game, they don't know how to defend in deeper positions. They know how to defend higher up the pitch. The mistake was to try to defend by controlling the midfiled. They should have gone for a slugfest and would have lost max. 4:2 or something.
Yeah in that case you have to consider Aguero, Sterling, Sane. They played most mins. Bernardo Silva was just a sub player.
Agree, they have young forward line. Not sure how good they will be if they replace Aguero and David Silva with other players or when Pep leaves.
At the rate they're burning cash trying to win it, I think the Sheikhs might get there quicker if they just waltzed into the offices at the Bernabeu with a cheque for 3 billion and bought Real Madrid from it's members.
Not starting Aguero was a fecking mystifying decision. Jesus came into the game in shite form and played predictably terribly. Stick a competent striker in their team and last night could have turned out very differently.
Do you even read posts or just hit reply and talk to yourself?
I have said it in my first post, the game wasn't as important as Liverpool's. So not sure why you are making the same point again and again. My point was very clear, it wasn't a dead rubber. If it was, they would have rested all 11 players against us as they had just 2 days gap between 2 games.
Regarding losses, maybe they are tired. They have lost 5 in last 10 games. Playing intense football for so many months is very taxing, physically and mentally. This was something even Maldini said of Sacchi, how exhausting their training sessions was practising same drills and practising so many runs without any ball.
So maybe there is some truth that they are slowing down which shouldn't be surprising.
They could still have defended higher up the pitch whilst giving Pool more possession. He did it in the Bayern game I described and thrashed Klopp's Dortmund in front of their home fans. Similar to how we blitzed Pool in first half in our recent tie though we did it aerially. I agree imagining he could "defend' by hogging possession vs Pool was simply playing right into Klopp's strengths.
Pep will leave a machine behind. In the summer I see them targeting natural cover for Mendy, a Yaya Toure replacement to cover properly for KDB and D. Silva aging plus Fernandinho lacking natural cover and another wide attacker who can play as a false 9. All likely below age 26. IMO what Pep is building will out live his stay.
He wasn't fully fit. That was the tweet of that Alvarez lad who seems to be as close to the club (and specifically Aguero) as it comes.
I think Pep made a mistake by playing De Bruyne too deep last night. In midfield 3, De Bruyne should be the most advanced midfielder, he should be played near Liverpool's penalty box but he was more busy occupying "empty area" in the centre of pitch. Such a waste of talent.
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I wouldn't be so sure. Pep tactics of overloading sides and gaining numerical advantage helps lot of attackers. Bayern with almost same players weren't same under Ancelotti. With Heynckes they are looking good again. Will be interesting who will be their next coach.
Anyways too early for all this.
Last night was that type of match when you play your best attacker even if he is not fully fit, it's that simple.
Says the main who keeps repeating the same argument sans any regard to what he replied to...
Which is the problem here. You have made the unwarranted assumption that a dead rubber is a game for which a given side rest an entire 11. Yet it is simply one in which key starters of the spine of a team are given a breather for bigger things. Which is precisely what happened for the derby. They respected their fans enough to not drop the entire XI for a derby. But the resting of most of the spine was telling as to how the game was viewed.
They is truth in that I agree. But it is not as paramount as some are making out. Because for me they lost to the likes ofBasel due to complacency. To us because we wanted that result more and their focus was else where, and to pool twice simply because Klopp has the anti dote for Guadiola's favoured approach.
Yea. I also think it will possibly all depend on who follows him. If they don't recruit a manager with a similar desire for that kind of football and discipline, then it could stall.
Not really arsed to do multi quote thing.
You are just making up excuses now for every loss.
They played 7 first team players who played against Liveprool, how can you even say that's a dead rubber when City wanted to win and win the league against ManUtd? If it was a dead rubber players like David Silva, Sane, Sterling would have been rested. They rested only Jesus, KdB, Walker. Aguero wasn't even fit apparently.
There is a big difference between dead rubber and "not as important game as against Liverpool". It's not my mistake if you can't see past black or white.
In any case it's nice to see you're bravely fighting for Pep's corner in this thread.
Correct me if I’m wrong @Red Indian Chief Torn Rubber but didn’t they rest just 2 players? KdB & Aguero?
Thought @Red Indian Chief Torn Rubber is quoting his own post, had to check the username again to make sure he isn't. Yeah, they rested Jesus/Aguero, KdB and Walker. Just 3 players and all of them played from 70th min.
They didn't even rest their only defensive mid Fernandinho.
The invincibles and Chelsea under Jose are thrown into those conversations. Neither won the CL and in fact made 1 Semi between them. champs league isn't easy
Pep's teams are the image of him: intense, driven, controlling and, yes, prone to explode.
A Pep team is almost unassailable when things are going according to plan. His philosophy of football, difficult as it is to execute, is something to be admired when its being implemented well.
When things are not going to plan Pep has a tendency to blow up though and his teams are the same. You have to remember this is the man who had to take a sabbatical after the way Jose got into his head back at Barca. He's like a finely tuned instrument. Pluck the string the wrong way and it just goes. His teams reflect that. Its tough to knock them off their stride but if you can they'll be wobbly for a bit before they find their feet.
The best sides can capitalise on that. I think that's why Pep's sides have this odd tendency to give up goals over short spaces of time. Its like a big machine going down. It needs time to rev up again. In that 10-15 minutes you can do a lot of damage if you have world class players (or Will Grigg!
)
A Pep team is almost unassailable when things are going according to plan. His philosophy of football, difficult as it is to execute, is something to be admired when its being implemented well.
When things are not going to plan Pep has a tendency to blow up though and his teams are the same. You have to remember this is the man who had to take a sabbatical after the way Jose got into his head back at Barca. He's like a finely tuned instrument. Pluck the string the wrong way and it just goes. His teams reflect that. Its tough to knock them off their stride but if you can they'll be wobbly for a bit before they find their feet.
The best sides can capitalise on that. I think that's why Pep's sides have this odd tendency to give up goals over short spaces of time. Its like a big machine going down. It needs time to rev up again. In that 10-15 minutes you can do a lot of damage if you have world class players (or Will Grigg!
)And both sides were eliminated by PL sides like City just were.
Invincibles almost sacrificed everything for the league record iirc. Both aren't excuses for City tbh. Their opponent in QF was an English team from the league they are walking and the rest of the teams they met were piss easy. Now considering they are one of the best English teams in history according to the media, and considering the opponents they faced, it's an underwhelming CL camapign.
The invincibles also lost to a fellow PL team in the QFs
I said in the first line they sacrificed everything for the league record as the season went on.
Even if we went by your logic you still have Chelsea 2005-2006 , United 99 and United 2008. Bring one thing this City has done better than those.
But, but i thought they were the best team to ever graced the premier league?
A spanking from Liverpool + spoiling the party at Etihad from United + another defeat against Liverpool in the most important game of the season.
2006-2009 United, 2004-2006 Chelsea teams were much better teams than this City. They are not the best ever but the most overrated team in the premier league history.
A spanking from Liverpool + spoiling the party at Etihad from United + another defeat against Liverpool in the most important game of the season.
2006-2009 United, 2004-2006 Chelsea teams were much better teams than this City. They are not the best ever but the most overrated team in the premier league history.
They can still break almost every PL record. They deserve to be in the discussion for best PL team ever. Because they lost in a completely different competition should not disqualify them.
Pep needs a big target Man like fellaini or crouch. How many times they are on the opponent half and can't score because enemy have 10 players in their box?
Well they have done as well as Chelsea 2005-06 in terms of trophy haul but will amass more points and goals. I feel the 2 United teams have a better say to the best side as we cleaned up on major trophies but after this result, the knee jerk is to now underrate their achievements
But, I do not understand how we judge who is the best PL side by what they did in other competitions. I personally hold our 06-07 side as the best United side of the PL era even though they did not win the CL like 98-99 or 07-08.
They are a great team. They aren't the best English team in history though as the media was trying to force us to believe, that's all.