Kippax Kidd
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Not that it's outdated. But he's playing a system that doesn't suit the players he is picking.
Pep Guardiola - 2025/26
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Agreed, but that was a different time. Does anyone believe this club with this ownership's ambitions would be OK with a five year run like that? Pep himself would leave on his own accord if that were the case.
I've never seen a successful top level club with this level of instability in terms of player selection, in game decisions, and tactics from game to game over such a period of time.
I don't care about those saying "Pep out" and such nor am I questioning his ridiculously successful career.
I'm saying the way he's been moving in recent times is bizarre and he''s actually been a big contributor to our struggles over the past 14 months. Anyone saying otherwise is missing the point...
People are talking about his loyalty to the old guard but this is the first time he's had an old guard. He wasn't at Barca or Bayern long enough for there to be an old guard. If his insistence on relying on the Unc"s, etc. was working it would be understandable. But it isn't. It's failing spectacularly.
Yep, the future of Gundo, Akanji, and Ake...
We played some excellent football vs Al Hilal, creating many many chances. Guess what, fans were unhappy because we lost.
The name of the game is victory. No manager in history has been as good as Pep at winning leagues and trophies.
The idea that one year after becoming the only manager in the history of English football to win 4 in a row and 8 months after becoming the first manager in the history of European competitions to go 26 games unbeaten, Pep is done or not good enough is bullshit.
Pep might fail to win other trophies with us, but at this stage he is the best we can hope for. It might be impossible to replace him with a manager of the same quality.
That would be a valid point if all our players were available and we still sucked. It is based on one game: vs. Al Hilal, in which we created enough chances to win it anyway.
We miss Rodri's quality in the middle big time. We saw what happened in his first start since September.
All criticisms might have some weight after Rodri is back and the new players integrated. That will take time.
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it´s not about the chances we create ,it´s how easily we concede chances and opponents don´t usually need more than 1 shot to score against us. Whats the point of having 70 % possesion and 30 shots ,when opponents with 6 shots still hit 4 and beat you. This is unacceptable.
Yeah we missed Rodri but I’m not sure that should be the case when we have spent 300m since he got injured and we were playing an average team.Hope Pep can sort this out but alarm bells were ringing for me when he made Bernardo captain.
St.Pauli support
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I'd say his insanely high line vs good sides definitely is.
Enrique, Slot and Alonso are very well playing with a defence to win matches.
Bayern with Flick and also Kompany have had many problems playing a high line,
while Flick's Bacra has been killed by Inzaghi's Inter in a CL semi where you defo shouldn't give too much room as opponents have top quality.
Pep copied that Barca-Inter debacle vs Al hilal.
I guess Inzaghi still can't believe his luck!...
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Most of the money went to sign talented players, not ready made stars.
Real had Mbappe, Vin Jr, Bellingham, Rodrygo, Valverde, etc. and won nothing last season.
The idea that you can instantly replace the best player in the world with several signings is desperate.
What many on here can't understand, despite it being very simple, is that building a new team takes time. Impatience is understandable, fans want wins, etc, but Pep isn't a magician.
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City's defensive line height last season averaged at 51.7. Arsenal's was 51.3. Liverpool's was 49.8.
And it's going up not down
Here is how City have changed their defensive line over the last few years:
You can also see here how high the line is of every team comparative to their league position and in almost every league measured, the highest line team is winning it.
I'm not unsympathetic to the idea that a high line is a problem, I just think it's not really the problem but it's related to the problem and is pretty simple so people are making wild leaps in logic to support it.
This is just the latest pundit meme that's now going around and as it half sort of makes sense from the eye test, people are agreeing with. It's not represented in reality.
Kippax Kidd
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It's not the tactics . It's the players that are going to be selected to play it . Dias and Akanji , Gundogan , Bernardo . Suicidal .
mexico1970
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Pep will eventually get it right again and IMHO before too long, little bit of faith in the bald fraud would go a long way.
Again, this is definitely an issue and more legs in midfield is going to help alleviate the issue. But the problem as I see it is that players are just better now than they were 10 years ago.
10 years ago, the idea of a defender playing against us and winning a transition then smacking a perfectly driven 30 yard pass to an on running forward behind the lines was an extremely rare event. Now it's not so rare, we saw it against Al-Hilal where they were able to get from their 18 yard box to one vs one with our keeper in two passes straight to feet. There's no real way to defend against this, it has to be stopped at the source.
Which is why I think more legs to pressure when we lose will definitely help and why I think he's been forced to play Doku and Savinho inside and use NOR/Nunes as width at times last season - just having more players in the proximity of the ball will help stop that initial pass. But it doesn't "solve" the issue, it just alleviates it, which should be good enough for us to be successful but it's never going to go away.
A highline with 2 players is very different from a highline with 3 players.
Yes it's true the highline has been a Pep staple for a while.
But we usually have 3 atb with someone pacy like Walker covering for long balls with his speed since the CCB might not be quick enough.
I'd have no issue with Khus doing this for Dias in a back 3.
In a back 2, you need both CBs to be fast since there is nobody else to help you there.
Yes it's true the highline has been a Pep staple for a while.
But we usually have 3 atb with someone pacy like Walker covering for long balls with his speed since the CCB might not be quick enough.
I'd have no issue with Khus doing this for Dias in a back 3.
In a back 2, you need both CBs to be fast since there is nobody else to help you there.
blueparrot
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Probably why we are linked to Livramento though, a player that won’t be an attacking full back like Ait Nouri, an intelligent fullback that knows when to move into midfield reads the game and is back in position to see the danger.
I have no idea if we can get him nor who the alternatives are but the fact he’s linked show the coaches and club understand the issues.
The description from my Newcastle fan friend of Livramento is he seems involved in lots of build ups but when attacked he is always in position to snuff out danger without noticing how he got there.
Yeah Livramento may not be good going forward (or just not used in that way), but is alot more conservative and can play in a back 3 or slightly invert if needed to snuff out danger.
Pep asking Ait Nouri to invert all game was weird imo. I don't really see a problem with Ait Nouri as an attacking LB , in fact, the main problem with say the 1st goal is Pep is asking him to defend more than attack!, Nunes somewhat accomodated for him and I thought the balance was good in that respect.
But for me, it was more how the rest of the team worked around them and the personnel was not well suited for it.
To be honest, I looked back at some of the goals we conceded, and while Ait Nouri does poorly, I noticed on say the 1st goal, there was a sort of calamity of errors or unfortunate events, I thought Gundogan, Gvardiol and Reijnders were also quite poor there.
Gundogan and Reijnders is also a really weak double pivot, as Bernie seem to be more of the 10 than Gundogan for some reason.
Then primarily Reijnders, but also to a degree Ait Nouri are at fault for the 2nd goal.
These first 2 goals don't really have anything to do with a high line that everybody seems to be discussing lately.
Then I watched the 3rd and 4th goal, again not conceded due to a highline, but it showed another problem.
Dias and Ake are piss poor on the 3rd goal, neither doing well enough in the air, and perhaps thought the other had Koulibaly marked, so maybe bad communication.
The 4th goal, Dias mistakenly (in my opinion) gets dragged left when the ball is moved left, perhaps again bad communication, because maybe he thought Ake and Ait-Nouri would also move with him, but they stayed back, leaving a big gap between Dias and Ake... which Bernardo Silva filled (the shortest player).
Then when the cross comes in, Ake is confused since he has 2 players to mark since Bernardo is never winning a header.
So while even I found myself joining into this highline discussion regarding Dias and his lack of pace perhaps being an issue at some point, ironically, all 4 goals concede had nothing to do with that, and instead could be boiled down to goals 1 and 2 being players in bad spots to handle the transition with bad decisions made, and goals 3 and 4 being that Dias and Ake have really bad communication.
Now that I think about it, have Dias and Ake ever been a CB pair before?
blueparrot
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Found this a good watch,Esteemed Kompany, but if you haven’t time skipping to the analysis of the goals they pretty much agree with you.
I think it’s fair to say that although Pep was previously helped by having the best resources available as far as players were concerned….the sum was still greater than the parts due to his fantastic coaching, revolutionary tactics and pure genius.
Player wise Liverpool and Arsenal have now caught us up and even started to overtake us but for me the most worrying thing is we have lost the Pep factor.
He should still be getting more out of the players/squad available but unless he embraces some of the newer, younger, fitter players and ditches some of the old guard, the gap is only going to get bigger (especially with Liverpool) and some of the chasing pack are also going to catch us up.
No problem with the likes of Gundogan, Ake,Akanji etc being part of the squad, but they certainly wouldn’t be starters for any of our competitors.
I’m not sure how seriously Pep was taking the CWC, however we should always be beating the likes of Al Hilal (realise they are not a bad team) and Peps tactics and team selection were a major factor in us losing that game.
If Rodri is not available or fit to start…..play the one other defensive midfielder we have in the squad (Gonzales)…..same as the number 10….why play Bernardo who has not played there for years, when Cherki, Foden or Bobb are more comfortable in that position.
Player wise Liverpool and Arsenal have now caught us up and even started to overtake us but for me the most worrying thing is we have lost the Pep factor.
He should still be getting more out of the players/squad available but unless he embraces some of the newer, younger, fitter players and ditches some of the old guard, the gap is only going to get bigger (especially with Liverpool) and some of the chasing pack are also going to catch us up.
No problem with the likes of Gundogan, Ake,Akanji etc being part of the squad, but they certainly wouldn’t be starters for any of our competitors.
I’m not sure how seriously Pep was taking the CWC, however we should always be beating the likes of Al Hilal (realise they are not a bad team) and Peps tactics and team selection were a major factor in us losing that game.
If Rodri is not available or fit to start…..play the one other defensive midfielder we have in the squad (Gonzales)…..same as the number 10….why play Bernardo who has not played there for years, when Cherki, Foden or Bobb are more comfortable in that position.