Discussion: Potential Pellegrini Replacements {merged}

[Damanino]

Thats interesting to think about if Guardiola cant beat a Porto side to the semifinal with a very strong Bayern squad, is he good enough for us?:)
Our squad imo weaker than Bayern.

Why not try Porto manager instead?:)

 

[The Light Was Yellow Sir]

Without wishing to seem like I wear blue tinted glasses, I do find the majority of this thread, and ones very similar to it, somewhat depressing. I appreciate this season has been as disappointing as two seasons ago and I am in no way an apologist for our current manager. In fact, I tend to agree that his time may well be up.
What I would say is that the pram currently has no toys in it. The reactions on here are a mixture of:
Team and manager going through a rough patch? Get rid of them all.
Winning 4 trophies, from as poor a starting point as we were, in 3 years out of 5? Not having that, it's not good enough. In fact, it's so bad, I'm not going anymore!

It is undeniable that this season has been disappointing to say the least, and I know full well that people can use statistics to cover a multitude of sins but here goes.

Most shots, most shots on target, most shots in the penalty area, least number of shots against, least number of shots against which were on target. Most possession, most number of passes and second most accurate passes (0.1% behind). All these stats are City.
What this suggests is that things aren't quite as bad as they appear and, as ever, it's shades of grey, rather than being black and white.
We now have 6 games to put our differences and reservations aside and back this team we have. This team that have given us monumentally more ups than downs. I, for one, will be there on Sunday, supporting them until the game is over.
CTID

You missed current premier league top scorers.

Quite right. Apologies for that oversight.

 

[Damocles]

Serious question but how good a manager to do you have to be with Messi in the side? Luis Enrique is now doing as well as Guardiola used to do at Barca while Pep himself is struggling in the CL just like last year.

I suppose what I am getting at is, is Pep all his cracked up to be?

Were they to not qualify I imagine plenty of the Munich Mafia will be baying for his blood.

Well you don't say just turn up on a Saturday and say "right lads, give Lionel the ball, ok? Cheers lads bye" then go on the piss for the rest of the week. He's still the manager of a football club with lots of different personalities that might clash or whatever and needs to get them all pulling in the right direction, and needs to get them all prepared defensively and attacking wise both in terms of scouting and working on specific routines in training.

But management does seem a lot easier when you have Lionel Messi and the best football team who has ever lived at your disposal I would presume.

I've always said that I prefer Klopp because he consistently shown that he can build teams and adapt to changing circumstances around him which is where Pep is yet to be proven in my opinion. He isn't shit at building squads and implanting his ideas on older players but he's had it easier than most in that regard. Certainly not the man who I would be picking for City if it were my choice not because of any lack of talent but because he's never done the job before that we need him to do.

Klopp has not only done this job but he's done it starting from a much lower level and taken it to a much further place.

 

[OB1]

Klopp ain't a yes man and that's what the two amigos want, so I doubt he will be showing up any time soon

Pep isn't a yes-man either!

Just reading the Mirror site and McDonnell has a different spin. A more exciting one, but probably bollocks. He says City want Pep to resign and join THIS summer, and if he doesn't they could turn to Klopp and Ancelotti. I like that scenario but the idea of Pep quitting Bayern for us this summer seems almost as farfetched as our chances of winning the league now.

Well with Bayern being 2-0 down he may not get the option to resign!

A friend who supports Bayern reckons the German press think Klopp is going to Bayern...

 

[blueparrot]

Thats interesting to think about if Guardiola cant beat a Porto side to the semifinal with a very strong Bayern squad, is he good enough for us?:)
Our squad imo weaker than Bayern.

Why not try Porto manager instead?:)

I would still have my money on Bayern in the semis not Porto

 

[Blue Mooner]

Tonights PSG v Barca champions league game has proven the quality you are up against v Barcelona. Big reality check for City fans imo.

Unfortunately, some City fans have suffered from delusions of grandeur and to blame Pellegrini is a massive disservice to the quality of the opposition. imo it was the barca game and the damage to confidence that these game caused that has resulted in this recent slump.

I don't want to see Pelle replaced but the only manager for which you might think it worthy is Pep.

 

[Davs 19]

Pep isn't a yes-man either!

Just reading the Mirror site and McDonnell has a different spin. A more exciting one, but probably bollocks. He says City want Pep to resign and join THIS summer, and if he doesn't they could turn to Klopp and Ancelotti. I like that scenario but the idea of Pep quitting Bayern for us this summer seems almost as farfetched as our chances of winning the league now.

Well with Bayern being 2-0 down he may not get the option to resign!

A friend who supports Bayern reckons the German press think Klopp is going to Bayern...

Tbf OB, they've taken half the team, they may as well add the manager.......

 

[dobobobo]

Well with Bayern being 2-0 down he may not get the option to resign!

A friend who supports Bayern reckons the German press think Klopp is going to Bayern...

Tbf OB, they've taken half the team, they may as well add the manager.......

Very true.

 

[Alex - City Matters]

Sorry for being pedantic but it's important to find the logic behind these types of things before you can argue them.

I think you're probably correct when they are talking about being more like Barcelona but this doesn't mean replicating their playing style but instead the business processes that made them successful. Barca are the best run club in football outside of perhaps Bayern Munich. Their brand is nothing but positives - they have the Catalonian thing; Mes Que Un Club, the youth development thing, Lionel Messi the undisputed best player in the world, and they're constantly successful in both the domestic and European scenes. They are huge internationally not just because they are successful but THE WAY they gained success and specifically the way they grew their brand internationally are seen as masterstrokes. Most casual footy fans only hear about things like Qatar, FIFA corruption, billionaire owners and players on ridiculous wages. Barca were the "moral" team brand who were also massively successful.

It's true that City do want to try and replicate Barcelona but this isn't by playing a certain formation but by replicating the same feel-good factor around the club. Soriano has previously said that he'd like certain attributes in the way City play football but don't really boil down to anything more than "play attacking football so that I can sell the club more around the world". Begiristain is the man whose job it is to impart a specific style of football (again, not a formation) from the under 9s to the first team as numerous clubs have shown around the world that this helps facilitate youth team promotions and integrations much better. His style is just "play attacking football with a high defensive line and high possession". So a little bit more distinct than Soriano's "give me something I can sell" but still not an order that is unthinkable for managers to work within. A high possession game REQUIRES a high defensive line to be successful for a start so that's a bit of redundancy there and shapes it down to "play attacking football that's possession based".

Managers then implement that in their respective teams, whether you are Manuel Pellegrini or the Under 9s manager. Formations are irrelevant to this, you can play a 4-6-0, 3-4-3 or 4-2-3-1 and still play an attacking possessional game with a high line. Manchester United in their 4-4-2 days in the late 90s used to play with a high defensive line and a passing based game despite their reputation as a crossing team.

What I'm getting at is that the footballing commandments handed down are really extremely broad to the point where any manager in the world can look to fit inside of them. This reputation that they want a "yes man" basically came from the previous handling of the Mourinho/Guardiola situation when Rijkaard was on the way out and people saw the Mancini sacking then sort of added it up as a trend.

Essentially when Rijkaard was getting the sack with half a season to go, some of the board members wanted to promote Guardiola to the first team coaching position. Txiki fought against them because he recognised how talented Pep was and thought diving him into an unsuccessful campaign would be hurting him long term more than helping him and a "fresh start" would be better. When the interviews were happening for the post, he went to Lisbon and met Mourinho who gave a PowerPoint presentation on the deficiencies of Barca and what he'd change and when. Begiristain was the main decision maker in the room and told Mourinho that he was extremely impressed with the thoroughness of the presentation. Mourinho thought he was nailed on for the job as did a few others there, but mainly due to hesitations about his attitude concerning La Masia and him being a generally negative figure in the media they decided to go with Pep. A decision that when added to the previous one about the mid-season drop-in, Txiki Begiristain was credited for.

Unfortunately the suspicion was that Mourinho then went to his sycophantic mates in the press (and nobody has more in the modern game than Mourinho), who then branded Txiki as "not having the balls" to appoint Mourinho because he'd "rock the boat". Added to this, many Barca fans at this time were upset with Rijkaard because dressing room unrest regarding the effort of Ronaldinho (or lack thereof) was starting to leak out into the press - with Samuel Eto'o having a public dig at him for not working hard enough and Rijkaard for not doing anything about it. The Barca fans thought that they needed a stern disciplinarian to kick people up the arse like Mourinho rather than this reserves manager who the Director of Football had some hard-on over and was telling everyone who was better than Mourinho. Txiki bet his career on that decision, and Pep paid him back in Champions Leagues and domestic domination.

With this narrative already established about Txiki, when Mancini left and Soriano spoke about the need for a holistic approach what he actually seems to have meant was that he wanted Mancini to stop being a twat to people at the club (staff members outside his own group basically), and pay much more attention to the Youth Academy. Let's not forget that Mancini put Lombardo in there as a power play to stop that criticism coming in to him. But still, his problem was that Begiristain saw at Barcelona under Rijkaard and Guardiola the difference between a positive and respectful attitude at the club and a bunch of people shouting at each other in terms of how much of a difference it can make.

This is the thing with these stories; they are never really true. They are just a bit of a myth later half-remembered then confirmed to be a fact. People still get stuck up on this idea that we can only hire certain managers and it's generally wide of the mark. Diego Simeone might not fit perfectly due to a combative style and Mourinho wouldn't fit for the same reasons as Barca but 99% of managers in the world could work under this system without a problem. Klopp fits us perfectly - it's not about lack of passion or a certain formation or passing percentage, it's to do with the attitude under which you work which can then spread throughout the club. And mainly that Soriano can then sell the brand as a happy and successful club.

This is what holistic really means - everything fits together into a greater whole. Klopp would absolutely definitely add to this rather than take away from it.

Sounds like someone has been reading graham hunters book. You keep going on about holistic this and that but end of the day football is won by 11 players on a pitch Galvanised by an organised manager who gets the best out of people. Liverpool and united didn't need directors of football when they were the powerhouses in Europe. Don't see why we do tbh

Perhaps you don't - but Khaldoon, Mansour et al clearly do.

One thing I have noticed more recently though, after watching Bayern under Pep's guidance, is that I actually preferred the Heynckes' Bayern outfit and the way they played the game. Klopp's style was a little like that, only with lesser players at his disposal - yet he still worked wonders.

That's been the major idea with a lot of the German press and German football fans, including myself. Of he doesn't win the Champions League with Bayern, his time there will have largely been a failure and another Madrid debacle could see the end of him there IMO. There's no doubting this side aren't as ruthless at the Heynckes machine.

 

[mancity1]

Without wishing to seem like I wear blue tinted glasses, I do find the majority of this thread, and ones very similar to it, somewhat depressing. I appreciate this season has been as disappointing as two seasons ago and I am in no way an apologist for our current manager. In fact, I tend to agree that his time may well be up.
What I would say is that the pram currently has no toys in it. The reactions on here are a mixture of:
Team and manager going through a rough patch? Get rid of them all.
Winning 4 trophies, from as poor a starting point as we were, in 3 years out of 5? Not having that, it's not good enough. In fact, it's so bad, I'm not going anymore!

It is undeniable that this season has been disappointing to say the least, and I know full well that people can use statistics to cover a multitude of sins but here goes.

Most shots, most shots on target, most shots in the penalty area, least number of shots against, least number of shots against which were on target. Most possession, most number of passes and second most accurate passes (0.1% behind). All these stats are City.
What this suggests is that things aren't quite as bad as they appear and, as ever, it's shades of grey, rather than being black and white.
We now have 6 games to put our differences and reservations aside and back this team we have. This team that have given us monumentally more ups than downs. I, for one, will be there on Sunday, supporting them until the game is over.
CTID

Well said , every cloud has a silver lining.

The only stat that matters is 18-7-7 though and unfortunately for MP that is not good enough combined with the cup exits the Charity Shield ( broadcast to more people on the globe bar Chumps League , FA Cup and World Cup ties ) and comprehensive albeit it one goal defeats to Barcelona.

His time is up.