Makes me laugh when people say he wasn't interested. It was a Champions League semi final against one of the biggest names in the game, if he's not "interested" in that then he would be working in a bank by now having never become a professional footballer. The fact was three of our big game players: Kun, Yaya and De Bruyne all went missing when we needed them the most. Yaya in particular in the past has shown he's no big game bottler so maybe the blame lies more with the manager.
I don't think it's that he wasn't interested and I do think Pellegrini's game management was abysmal. Aguero was so isolated and uninvolved he dropped into midfield to pick up the ball, only to just pass it two yards like the rest of the side. We were clueless.
Fernando couldn't pass forwards, Fernandinho was doing his best to get into decent positions and actually move, the rest were static. Yaya was trotting about trying to dictate play but we so slow on the ball it was incredibly easy for Real to limit his passing options. Aguero was so static. De Bruyne was wide and clearly prefers to be more involved centrally, he came to life a bit more in the second half - but had a bad game by his standards.
I said in the first leg that Aguero's lack of movement was part of the reason we didn't create much. Even when Silva was on. Real have Pepe and Ramos, they love a physical battle and they'll win that all day because they're seasoned pros who will man handle, push and do all the dirty work required to win the ball. Aguero might be stocky but he's not going to beat them in that sort of battle. But yet again he played to their strengths and was too static.
I do blame the manager completely for last nights poor showing. There was no real gameplan other than to counter attack - we didn't have a clear method of counter attacking and we should have. Ronaldo wasn't covering at all in the first half and Marcelo was getting forward as much as possible. That wasn't a shock on the night for anyone who knows Real Madrid. The gameplan should have been for Aguero to be central on the pitch and then make a darting run into that space vacated by Marcelo so the outball was into that area. Runners, i.e Navas, De Bruyne, Yaya (can he run?) should have then been looking to provide support on the overlap/in the box.
Instead the outball was more often than not an attempt to find Aguero to feet and the ball was easily won back. It's a basic gameplan and we were really poor.
The team didn't look like it knew how to play together. They were all static and walking for most of the game.
Is it that much of a surprise that our best chances in both games came from midfield runners drifting into space? Sterling made an excellent run in the home leg, we'd lacked that all game and whilst he should have scored, at least he got into the position and put Real's defence under pressure. Similarly, Fernandinho drifting into space created the chance in Madrid.
Apart from that though we were playing at walking pace. I remember two runs in behind Aguero made at home. One Silva overplayed the pass, the other he was offside. That was it. But that was how we needed to play to win the game. Get those centre backs on the move and stretched. Modric and Kroos are not defensive midfielders, it would have been easy to escape their attentions and get into space.
