Atletico Madrid | Friendly (N) | Post Match Thread

[Xhavenjoe]

Good game

 

[Goaters]

Agree with most of this, although to be fair 90% of the doom-laden posts concern the other 35 minutes.
The bit in bold — not sure where you're seeing that today, mate. And I'm one of the few who's called for more patience for him. It's not a pleasure to say it, but he looked as though he didn't quite know where to be on the pitch.
It does occur to me, though, that it's his misfortune to be always brought in to a significantly weakened team.

With Phillips he’s clearly struggling and lacks confidence atm. He doesn’t particularly seem like he knows his role, but from the awful level he was I do see improvements with his one twos and the understanding of where to be. Fundamentally though the point he’s at now he has to improve his agility a lot. I won’t write him off yet and for the lads sake I hope he turns it round.

It must be an awful situation for the lad as he’s not stupid, he knows %90 percent of city fans slate him and I’m sure any human being would feel that rather personally.

 

[Keeper!]

Kovacic had a chance and ballooned it over the bar, is his shooting/ composure weak hence his low goals across his career?

Maybe, but his footballing qualities are there to see, he will be a good solid adittion.

I have to say I worry where the goals and assists will come from , Haaland/ Alvarez apart

 

[Cheadle_hulmeBlue]

A decent warm up game.

 

[billblu]

watched the 1st 57 minutes and was then outvoted for F1.Things seemed to be going quite well I suppose you can't lose 7 or 8 players out of your 1st 11 that would probably get in to every over prem team and not struggle against a team that set up like athletic Madrid do think it would of been a good learning curve for some of the younger players.where perrone and Palmer injured?

 

[Cheadle_hulmeBlue]

Its not based on pre-season alone.
I've always felt Grealish needs to do more in the final 3rd even when he improved his overall play last season. Now with Mahrez and Gundo gone thats 40G/A gone from the team, he needs to produce we're not talking about a young player, he's 28.

Phil for me still lacks that control to play central, first and foremost he just needs to play consistently starting with on the wing, time will tell if Pep will move him central.

He’s only going to learn control by playing in the middle. Surely you aren’t judging him on pre season either, it’s going to take months before we can judge him

 

[Kippax Street 1880]

He’s only going to learn control by playing in the middle. Surely you aren’t judging him on pre season either, it’s going to take months before we can judge him

He's currently replacing Kev aswell, who is the antithesis of control and given licence to take more risks and create. Thought Phil was fine in that regard anyway today, he didn't lose the ball in dangerous areas.

 

[Burtonblue]

First half pretty good. Controlled the game well but lacked penetration. Tended to over complicate playing out of the back and Griezman reminded me of what a good player he would have been for City…
Foden looked pretty sharp.
Second half fell apart as too many changes with too many inexperienced players meant we lost our rhythm and gave the ball away too easily. Kovatic is definitely a good signing but any thoughts of Phillips backing up Rodri in the middle are wide of the mark. The boy just isn’t interested or just not good enough. Those saying we should wait are not being objective. He’s had plenty of opportunities to show what he can do and so far has failed on each occasion. I like all here want him to do well but just can’t see it happening.
Pity cos he seems a lovely lad.

 

[Kippax Street 1880]

watched the 1st 57 minutes and was then outvoted for F1.Things seemed to be going quite well I suppose you can't lose 7 or 8 players out of your 1st 11 that would probably get in to every over prem team and not struggle against a team that set up like athletic Madrid do think it would of been a good learning curve for some of the younger players.where perrone and Palmer injured?

I think Palmer has a niggle, not sure about Perrone

 

[Bluewars]

He’s only going to learn control by playing in the middle. Surely you aren’t judging him on pre season either, it’s going to take months before we can judge him

No definitely not on preseason, he's missed a lot of games in the last two seasons, needs to be playing regularly before he can cement that central spot, Pep knows best.