This was a disappointing performance from the players and the manager (in terms of his substitutions). The lingering and ever so infuriating tendency to approach away games at a slow pace, basically just going through the motions and hope that something happens was on display today.I could not help but shout quicker!! quicker!!!, move!!, move!!, up the tempo!!, for most of the first half and it reminded me a lot about last season. Nobody wanted to take responsibility, nobody wanted to shoot and nobody really wanted to get stuck in.
We lacked leadership and spirit all over the park in contrast with the Cardiff players and on the balance of things their honesty in approach and their defensive hard work more or less made then deserve something out of the game.
Aguero really worried me today. I thought, by selling Tevez we have freed ourselves from the attacking approach of putting your head down in and around the box and trying to do everything yourself but Aguero showed that today and was terrible. Pellegrini should have taken him off in the second half. But I hope Aguero's attacking attitude today is a one off and he will not start being selfish in good positions like Tevez.
Yaya toure sat way too deep to have any influence on the attack. I once pondered that Kompany is the most important attacking player in the squad and I am now beginning to belive it. This is because he provides that leadership and drive from the back with the ball, which then inspires the other players to move foward and build up momentum on offense. So Kompany being injured is a big loss but defensively and offensively.
Dzeko was fairly subdued today but I still think he posed more treat with the ball and should not have been substituted but his injury will be a cover for that. Navas should have also been on the pitch and the decision to substitute him after we scored was strange indeed.
Ultimately it was our lack of leadership during set pieces that cost us the game and everybody is to blame for that.
The only player that did a respectable and honest shift today was David Silva.
It is easy to get carried away with negativity but this was indeed very embarrassing and I fear we may have lost some fear factor that we gained after the first match because most teams will now be emboldened against us particularly away from home.
After the wigan match, I posted something about precedence and how it is the word I fear the most. Pellegrini may now begin to realize that his work is significantly more difficult that he thought. We will still win the league but it will take a lot of diagnosis, purification and insightful man management by Pellegrini to really possess and inspire the players to be ready for every game and hope they don't let him and the club down once again as a consequence of precedence.
On the bright side..
We are only 2 games in and nobody expects any team to win every match. So we have to move on and hope that the team learn from this experience and become stronger, more focused and have greater contempt for halfheartedness.
