City, EDS and next summer

[jollylescott]

Should we give our young players a chance?

I have been thinking this for a while now.

I know that there is incredible pressure to win at all costs and that this leads to an expectation that the best available players be played as much as possible, but in my opinion we urgently need to refresh the team. As many have said a lot of our players appear to be complacent, and project a lack of desperation and hunger.

One of the things I think we lack is the enthusiasm, vitality and freshness of youth in our team. A player like Pozo did very well in his only cameo appearance this season. Why not give him a place on the bench, rather than a player like, for example, Boyata (I am not picking on him because I believe he does have talent)? It's generally accepted that Boyata is not going to get on the pitch, so isn't that an ideal chance to at least put a player like Pozo on the bench? It would also send a message to the EDS squad that there is hope for them if they continue to play well. I would also include players like Ambrose and Barker in the same category as Pozo. Speaking of Barker, wouldn't it be fantastic to see a young English player given a cameo appearance in a game!

Overall I believe that MP needs to revisit his approach to the younger players. We could do with a recharging of our batteries, and I can think of no better way than giving a young player a chance.

I was wondering what others think? Or is it too big a risk?

 

[chris85mcfc]

Re: Should we give our young players a chance?

No I think you're spot on, I think we need the hunger and enthusiasm of someone that really wants to prove they can make it

I would love to see a young lad on the bench in a home game that we should be winning

Last season would have been an ideal time when we were cruising in our home games but it was probably a bit too soon for Pellegrini to be looking at the youth players, but now in his second season he should know who can manage a cameo at the top level

We should have had a couple in the squad for the Newcastle game, that was an ideal opportunity

 

[moomba]

Re: Should we give our young players a chance?

I'd love to see it, but don't see enough of the kids to know who is ready for it, or would benefit from it.

I know the club has a long term goal of having academy products in the first team. I think before we can do that we've got to cut down on a few of the senior players in the squad. All well and good to have the kids sitting on the bench, but it's hard to tell a senior player who is also looking to play that they'll be sat in the stands because we want to give a kid some experience.

For me, the two senior players for every position probably needs to be given up, then we'll see a few more opportunities given to the kids.

Could that cost us a few results short term? Would that be an acceptable price to pay? For me yes and yes.

 

[MeatHunterrr]

Re: Should we give our young players a chance?

Managers at City are under too much pressure to win things. That is probably the reason we haven't seen any youngsters really.

For example in Barcelona its different when you have only Real Madrid as title rivals and the rest of the league are not quite competitive. Premier League you give any invitation to opponent, they usually take it.

 

[BlueMoonz1977]

Ok just want to throw a question out there and get your thoughts after the form we are currently in and the attitude of the players after the fiasco of the CSKA game.

Regarding the players that we have purchased in order to elevate our club to its current standard, for me there are a select few who I would say are good enough to take us that step further and would not need to be replaced, they are Hart, Kompany, Zabaleta, Fernandinho, Silva and Aguero.

The rest of the squad I believe are not at the standard required to make that step up in order to challenge the likes of Bayern, Real Madrid, Barcelona and PSG. And I think that since we have been in the champions league our form has shown that to be true. A few may say that last year we progressed out of the group, but we made very hard work of that and although we did well against Barca we still got knocked out.

The other members of our squad may well be good enough to challenge in the premier league, as we have proved by winning 2 titles in 3 years, but good enough for Champions League domination - no not for me.

Sagna -any improvement on Zabaleta, No
MDM - decent enough and proved doubters wrong but age against him now
Clichy - not good enough
Fernando - jury still out on him for me, meant to be the steel to protect the back four but not of late
Yaya - Has been a main stay and an important player for where we are now, but maybe time to get a replacement in because attitude is in question
Dzeko - plays well in spells and has got important goals, but tends to have more dips in form than not
Navas - has pace but no end product, crossing ability sometimes shocking, and frustrates because he fails to beat his man most of the time
Jovetic - is he trying to hard to impress, meant to have loads of ability but cannot seem to gel into the team and tends to lose possession of the ball
Nasri - decent enough player but can go missing and can flatter to deceive

My answer to this problem would not be to actually go out and buy replacements for all these guys, because by doing this I think we could end up in a similar situation somewhere down that line to what we are witnessing now. What I believe we need to do now is gain more of a sense of identity with our first team, and to do this I think from next season we need to bring in maybe 3 of the EDS lads, and then buy the remaining players that are required to push on both domestically but most importantly in European football.

The EDS team have been playing fantastically well under Viera (who will become our 1st team manager one day). You could say that the EDS lads are not ready yet, but next year can be the time for them to step up, learn from the others and if it turns out to be a season of transition so be it.


No compare the purchases that we have made since the take over, and yes we have seen players that we now idolise and worship. But in comparison to what PSG have done, have we settled for what could be argued as second best ??

Twice we have been accused of standing still after winning the title and yes that was completely evident after our first title win. That following season the transfer strategy was not done with any structure and it seemed to be panic buys in the last 2weeks of the window. Now look at the players we brought in last summer, and yes we were restricted by not only FFP but also the quota situation with players for the champions league. What this made was for players I do not believe we would have gone out and purchased had those restrictions not been in place.

Do we believe that we would have targeted players such as Sagna, because I don't believe that.

We may win the title this season we may not, we might even still qualify from the group stage of the champions league be it by a miracle run of results going in our favour. But that would just be masking the issues we have with the current squad.

Issues that hopefully will be addressed this coming summer by not just purchasing a quota of other players but by bringing in some of the academy lads. We have had major issues at the minute regarding atmosphere at home games at the moment, being dissected by us fans and the media. Bringing in a least 3 academy prospects would go some way to allowing us fans to not only see them as just another player brought in but as part of the future of the club going forward.

 

[Craig]

Re: Should we give our young players a chance?

The sad thing is for all the money we seem to have pumped into our academy there has only been Sturridge who was or is good enough for where we are now. If there was somebody of outstanding talent in our u21 squad he'd have featured more by now and would be given a chance. Even if you look at the scum, ok they've produced a few more than us in the last 5 years or so but there is only Januzaj with the ability to play in a top 4 team. The same could be said of Chelsea they've spent millions but not produced anyone since Terry. They always do well in the youth cups and of plenty ex Chelsea youths have decent careers but the standard we require is so high.

 

[CatMan]

Barker, Fofana, Angelino, Pozo, Lopez and Denayer.

All good enough now to start being blooded.

 

[BlueMoonz1977]

Barker, Fofana, Angelino, Pozo, Lopez and Denayer.

All good enough now to start being blooded.

Yep I would agree with that, a few could argue that managers are under to much pressure to win trophies. My argument to that would be it that it has to start somewhere and I believe the time would be after this season.

 

[waspish]

Barker, Fofana, Angelino, Pozo, Lopez and Denayer.

All good enough now to start being blooded.

Totally agree but like at chelsea the manager is under pressure to win trophies and they know they won't be at the club more than 3 years so they don't play them, it will continually be this way unless they are told from above to do it..

 

[MeatHunterrr]

Barker, Fofana, Angelino, Pozo, Lopez and Denayer.

All good enough now to start being blooded.

Yep I would agree with that, a few could argue that managers are under to much pressure to win trophies. My argument to that would be it that it has to start somewhere and I believe the time would be after this season.

Even Ferran Soriano himself has stated clearly that "5 trophies in 5 years". I think he is not joking. League Cup doesn't count to that.