Discuss Pellegrini (Pt 2)

[George Hannah]

the criticism of our tactical shortcomings on here may be harsh but it is undeniably fair - and the stupidity of continually playing Garcia at CB when Lescott, Richards and even Boyata are obviously better options is baffling.

 

[Anonymous]

the criticism of our tactical shortcomings on here may be harsh but it is undeniably fair - and the stupidity of continually playing Garcia at CB when Lescott, Richards and even Boyata are obviously better options is baffling.

We've just won two away games on the bounce, one in the CL in fucking Russia. Picking Garcia may well be baffling, but it's been bafflingly effective this week.

Oh and playing Lescott last night would've been an absolute disaster and I love the guy and want him to sign a new contract and stay.

 

[JoeMercer'sWay]

the criticism of our tactical shortcomings on here may be harsh but it is undeniably fair - and the stupidity of continually playing Garcia at CB when Lescott, Richards and even Boyata are obviously better options is baffling.

We've just won two away games on the bounce, one in the CL in fucking Russia. Picking Garcia may well be baffling, but it's been bafflingly effective this week.

Oh and playing Lescott last night would've been an absolute disaster and I love the guy and want him to sign a new contract and stay.

you what now?

 

[Anonymous]

the criticism of our tactical shortcomings on here may be harsh but it is undeniably fair - and the stupidity of continually playing Garcia at CB when Lescott, Richards and even Boyata are obviously better options is baffling.

We've just won two away games on the bounce, one in the CL in fucking Russia. Picking Garcia may well be baffling, but it's been bafflingly effective this week.

Oh and playing Lescott last night would've been an absolute disaster and I love the guy and want him to sign a new contract and stay.

you what now?

Pretty straight forward. We've won two away on the bounce at tough places with Garcia as centre half and a system which some think leaves our cb's badly exposed. So saying choosing Garcia was baffling is.... well baffling IMO.

I think Lescott would've gotten whiplash playing against Doumbia on yesterday's pitch. Garcia may not be quick and may not be agile, but he's quicker and has more agility than Lescott and against a team who are going to play us on the counter like CSKA did, picking Garcia was the right decision.

 

[Gabriel]

He knows a great, great deal more about football than me, so I'm prepared to sit back, relax, and enjoy the ride.

 

[JoeMercer'sWay]

We've just won two away games on the bounce, one in the CL in fucking Russia. Picking Garcia may well be baffling, but it's been bafflingly effective this week.

Oh and playing Lescott last night would've been an absolute disaster and I love the guy and want him to sign a new contract and stay.

you what now?

Pretty straight forward. We've won two away on the bounce at tough places with Garcia as centre half and a system which some think leaves our cb's badly exposed. So saying choosing Garcia was baffling is.... well baffling IMO.

I think Lescott would've gotten whiplash playing against Doumbia on yesterday's pitch. Garcia may not be quick and may not be agile, but he's quicker and has more agility than Lescott and against a team who are going to play us on the counter like CSKA did, picking Garcia was the right decision.

My incredulity was more aimed at your desire to give the ball fearer Lescott a new contract.

Garcia was just "Pray, and let's hope Nasty and Zaba bail him out", and we just got away with it. Garcia's mainly in the team for his 89%+ passing rate in the league this season, unfortunately it takes him about 4 touches to get to that pass.

Last night performance was summed up by UEFA's wonderful stats. We had 13 phases of attacking momentum compared to CSKA's 6. CSKA only had 4 key moments in our penalty area, we had 8 in there's, and 20 in their final third compared to their 9 in ours.

The use of playing Garcia is shown in the team shapes, where you can see his confidence to pass the ball forward and through the lines to Yaya and Navas. The imbalance of playing Navas is there, like it was against Bayern, but Kolarov's willingness to push forward helps balance it out better. The presence of Silva also links the midfield to the strikers which was missing against Bayern. The imbalance with the left wing was reflected in the danger Tosic presented on the right for CSKA compared to Zubar on the left, as there was less cover in open play on the right. This was more pronounced when the half went on as AK became isolated. The main difference after their goal was Negredo moving in behind Kun instead of alongside him, and Wernbloom moved slightly more central and Tosic further up, creating a bit more space for Silva to pick up the ball. In the final 15, removing Silva and Aguero broke the attacking link from the midfield trio to the front line, meaning Dzeko became more isolated and Nasri too. Yaya sitting in front of Fern seems to work better with a close 3rd midfielder like Silva, whereas against Bayern and last night the opposition got more momentum when it was Nasri on in place of Silva, as there was more space in the midfield. I think that's something that has to be noticed and worked on.

 

[The Fat el Hombre]

We've just won two away games on the bounce, one in the CL in fucking Russia. Picking Garcia may well be baffling, but it's been bafflingly effective this week.

Oh and playing Lescott last night would've been an absolute disaster and I love the guy and want him to sign a new contract and stay.

you what now?

Pretty straight forward. We've won two away on the bounce at tough places with Garcia as centre half and a system which some think leaves our cb's badly exposed. So saying choosing Garcia was baffling is.... well baffling IMO.

I think Lescott would've gotten whiplash playing against Doumbia on yesterday's pitch. Garcia may not be quick and may not be agile, but he's quicker and has more agility than Lescott and against a team who are going to play us on the counter like CSKA did, picking Garcia was the right decision.

I'm not having that. Garcia was a fucking shambles again yesterday. Lescott should be ahead of him every time at centre half, no matter what

Yes we won two games which is of credit to Pellegrini and the players but this was more in spite of having garcia at centre back as opposed to winning them because he was centre back. I think we're more likely to have had 2 clean sheets had lescott played

 

[Anonymous]

I think we're more likely to have had 2 clean sheets had lescott played

We'll have to agree to disagree. I don't think we'd have kept two clean sheets with Lescott at the back, I think he'd have been rinsed repeatedly last night by Doumbia. Also think that had we played Lescott we wouldn't have been half as effective going forward (see JMW's post above about Garcia's passing).

 

[Worst Case Ontario]

Lescott is terrible, he is done

 

[forevermancity]

Hopefully he will sign a left back, centre back and another winger in jan or next summer

9/10 start for me, we have the right man!