Pep Guardiola - 2020/21 Performances

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Glad we have Pep. Let's win PL next season again and forget about cheat UCL. At least we need a proper LB who knows his position and replace Sterling.
 
SanPellegrini said:
Really funny when people on here call me entitled because I’m not happy with a performance like tonight

Like apparently we should all be eternally grateful for a premier league title and we should always think back to the division 2 season for perspective

Give me a break, look how much money we spent. WE SHOULD be contending for, and winning, the premier league. Even then, it wasn’t that convincing a title win. again, I’m not expecting us to win the UCL, but we were in the final against Chelsea and we should have turned up and played to our best strengths
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This club has done something quite extraordinary. We have gone from absolute shite to the dominant force in English football in what is a ridiculously short amount of time. On the one hand it keeps fans relatively grounded, on the other, it makes it seemingly impossible for some fans to let go of the past.

We aren’t little City anymore. We have to contend for all the big trophies and when we don’t win them, we should be upset/angry. It doesn’t make us entitled, it makes us realists. You can’t spend £1billion to bring in some of the worlds best players and the best manager in the world, and then shrug your shoulders and say we were in the 3rd tier 20 years ago so that makes it all ok.
 
Butchered it. Classic Pep. He has few weaknesses but he let his major one in again. On paper maybe his tactics could have worked, but you don't risk them in a final.

One game Pep... you only needed to stick for one game! No holding midfielder for a CL final against a team that literally beat us through counter attacking football twice in recent months.

Wow. Got in his head and clearly he felt high press and attacking overload would stop that ball through but Fernandinho could have also stopped it.

Gutted. He is an excellent manager but this competition is against him and us. Three league titles in four years where english teams have knocked us out in Europe...
 
ws01 said:
Literally no better player we have who plays better between the lines than Fernandinho.

Boggles the mind if that's what he said.
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Agree that Fernandinho should started.. For that, and for his experience, leadership, defensive boss... Yes i heard him say in press conference that the changes was to play better between the lines
 
Do not fear! For I have a solution. After this season let Pep take a year out to refresh. We hire a manager with the sole aim of winning the CL. We do that then Pep comes back the year after and we’re all happy
 
Well, I (and most of us) already vented a little, so despite this awful showing, I think this is, by far, Pep's best season.

Our team is, by far, the worse City team Pep's had offensively. In the last 4 seasons, we had Sterling on his peak, Sane, Aguero, KDB, Bernardo, David Silva, even Fernandinho... but this season only Foden and Gundogan (and a little bit Mahrez and KDB) have had a great season for their standards. What Pep has done with this team on this season, I don't think any other manager could've done it.

BUT we need 2 elite offensive players. Bernardo is a great role player, but he cannot be a starter. Mahrez and Gundogan are both really good, but neither of them are trully top 10-15 in the world material. And Sterling...Only KDB and Foden are trully elite. We need a 9, and an offensive MC or elite RW.
 
I love Pep and I love what he’s brought to our club but I remember thinking after Lyon that he’d never win the Champions League at at City. His wobble again tonight just confirms that.

We’ll never know, but I feel that the team were very disappointed with the selection tonight. We were glorious against Dortmund and Paris and utterly limp tonight.
 
Pep has changed the face of English football, and given City fans the most beautiful football and football success we have ever seen. Those are facts that are not in doubt.

The problem, though, is that Pep appears to have blind spots and has a propensity to tinker in ways some of us struggle to understand.

Tonight, most of us were wondering whether it would be Fernandinho, Rodri or Fernandinho AND Rodri, but there can be NO CITY FAN IN THE WORLD who would have suggested that playing NEITHER against a team that projects its power by overwhelming other teams with their midfield in a 5-2-2-1 formation with flying FBs.

While we have some of the best midfield playmakers in the world, we also showed we have almost ZERO POWER in the midfield when faced to go Mano á Mano against another powerful team.

This is third time in a row we have seen Pep outplayed by Tuchel’s straightforward power formation. The first two times we watched it, we nearly all had the “that’s only half our team” fallback position. Tonight? I don’t think so!

I defy anyone to suggest that KDB’s best position is thrashing himself as a false nine.

I defy anyone to suggest that against a back 5 with flying FBs, Sterling and Mahrez are going to track those FBs and defend like the Champions League depended on it.

I defy anyone to suggest that a small, but mobile midfield is the antidote to Chelsea’s 2-2+2 midfield they employ with the ball.

I defy anyone to suggest that City have an answer to ANY team that attacks the far post, or the through ball in the gap (esp on our left side).

I defy anyone to suggest that Pep, or City players, have laid a finger on Chelsea’s defensive back 5 in three games straight now.

I’m no genius coach, but I have now watched Chelsea play this SAME WAY THREE TIMES IN A ROW TO BEAT US.

It is no secret that City do not fare well against the 5-4-1, even when it’s West Brom playing it. For multiple seasons now, we have struggled with our slow build up against teams that collapse in on themselves into that 5-4-1 defensive set up. When it is against a team with quality going forward, it begs belief that we are sitting here talking about the same damned thing again.

And, for anyone who tells me we don’t need a big presence upfront, I would like to point out the impact Jesus and Aguero had when they came on....and the need to put one of our CBs upfront for the last 10-15 mins!

It’s been a fucking brilliant season, full of brilliant football, and the emergence of one of the best players in world football in Phil Foden (our MOTM by a wide margin today). However, there were TWO GAMES where Pep got it wrong, and so badly wrong that it “ruined” the season for many City fans.

For me, Pep (and a phalanx of supposed brilliant coaches) didn’t learn a damned thing about Chelsea in the games we lost, because THIS was the worst performance of the three in far and away the most important game of the three.

We barely laid a glove on their 3 CBS, Reese James and Chilwell were like shit on a blanket when Sterling and Mahrez were fed the ball, and Kante ruled the middle of the park.

And, while I will not make light of the disgustingly cynical foul on KDB by (cheating bastard..”oh, my head”) Rudiger, Kev has been a shadow of himself in the run in. Not sure if he simply ran out of gas from sprinting across the back line of teams, but why have the worlds best creative midfielder and then play him as the fucking CF rabbit pressing the opposition back line? Surely, that’s Bernardo/Jesus/Sterling/ Mahrez and even Foden’s stock in trade? Why are we flogging the shit out of our best player???

The quality of our team, and the fact that we have almost two first teams, is great, but it is time to revamp this particular squad. We have too much dead weight that isn’t doing the business.

I realize tonight isn’t the time to deconstruct the squad and attempt to rebuild it, but I’m going to say it anyway...
Mendy
Sterling
Jesus
Zinchenko
Mahrez(?)

...cannot be long term members of this squad. I’ve tried to be as constructive as possible about all 5 at any given time

We need to bring in a young LB and play Cancelo at LB, with Ake & Laporte filling in when necessary to bed in a new LB.

We need some steel in the middle of the park to replace the power and steel that was the backbone of this team for a decade with Yaya and Ferna.

We need a center forward. A big strong lad who knows where the goal is. It’s fine to play a false nine every now and then when the occasion might warrant, but, seriously...

We need understand the next iteration of football is a back 5/3, a midfield anchored with mobile steel, and an attacking midfielder and forward line that can dominate both the counter attack and attack down the lines, thhrough the channels and over the top.

That said...WHAT A FUCKING BRILLIANT SEASON!!!

Can hardly wait for the next one to start, so we can defend our title and see if we can reach the pinnacle of European football once more with a refreshing new look team with many of the same faces we already love!

Onwards and upwards...and there’s not much upwards from here. THAT is how good we have it at Manchester City right now.
 
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RayCTID said:
Fair play to them it was a tremendous defensive effort from them but it was hardly revloutionary.
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Exactly, Tuchel just played his team properly to their strengths, and defended us like pretty much every other team that's done well against us this season. Didn't see that coming. ;)
 
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