City v Chelsea Post Match Thread

[mancity111]

Re: We had to Lose Sometime

We bottled the biggest game of our season realistically, imo it's a bit of a cop out just to write it off as the sheer weight of probability.

There's probably a bigger issue in there.

Yeh it's called the injury list because of the high tempo we play.

The lack of depth in key areas will need to be addressed over the summer.

Not sure about the link of high tempo to a mountain of injuries to calfs and groins and hamstrings but if there is then all the more reason to get healthier quality back up.

You have little hope of title success if your key players break down on a regular basis.

 

[themachine]

Re: We had to Lose Sometime

Not really bothered by the loss. You could clearly see we lacked mobility in the midfield which played into chelski's hands. If fernandinho played this game would've panned out differently plus we missed a few sitters today. When MDM got the ball he'd stop and look for a pass like an extra CB. If it was dinho he would've ran and passed which would open up more pockets of space for silva and yaya etc. Plus he would've made plenty of off ball runs which MDM failed to do and it made it very easy for willian and co to block our supply lines. And he has no pace to get back in time for their counter.

Im not going to blame him it just wasnt the right game to play him in the middle with yaya. But now we can clearly see how vital dinho is in these matches. Im more worried about our injuries atm than anything else and hope no more key players get injured. People say we have depth but theres a gulf in class between dinho and yaya compared to garcia and rodwell and dont have reasonable back ups for them.

Time to move forward and pray that we overcome our injury woes.

 

[argyle]

Injuries are the difference.

Far too many in too many crucial positions at present.

yes tonight was a bridge too far. Any team without Kun, Nasri, Fernandinho would feel the impact.
To me it showed that Fernan is almost irreplaceable, and now we are without him for up to a month. In addition no Garcia or Milner.
Also it seems Alvaro played when not 100% fit.
We live to fight another day.
Learn from this and move on.

Injuries are only part of the story.

Pelligrini shouldn't have got us to try to play the way we normally play with so many key players out. Down the flanks our fullbacks were woefully exposed and midfield was over run.

Perhaps in this match we could have been just a little more conservative rather than nearly everyone bombing it upfield? Perhaps gone with Clichy at the back?

Having said that perhaps Dzeko and Silva should be on extended shooting practice?

 

[citymad]

Injuries are the difference.

Far too many in too many crucial positions at present.

yes tonight was a bridge too far. Any team without Kun, Nasri, Fernandinho would feel the impact.
To me it showed that Fernan is almost irreplaceable, and now we are without him for up to a month. In addition no Garcia or Milner.
Also it seems Alvaro played when not 100% fit.
We live to fight another day.
Learn from this and move on.

Injuries are only part of the story.

Pelligrini shouldn't have got us to try to play the way we normally play with so many key players out. Down the flanks our fullbacks were woefully exposed and midfield was over run.

Perhaps in this match we could have been just a little more conservative rather than nearly everyone bombing it upfield? Perhaps gone with Clichy at the back?

Having said that perhaps Dzeko and Silva should be on extended shooting practice?

Trouble is attack is the only way we know. We don't know another way. I'm not complaining because I'm loving the panache and style we play but against a top side like Chelsea and with so many key players missing we were bound to be found out. Disappointed with Dzeko because we know how good he can be but that's two games back to back that he's shooting has been terrible.

 

[argyle]

MUEN are asking if we should have paid up to get the Porto pair.

Window woe?

City were in for Porto's Eliaquim Mangala in the January transfer window but baulked at the price tag. Perhaps they should have paid up. Matija Nastasic is not the player he was last season and Aleks Kolarov is a yard too slow. Barcelona will have a field day if the Blues don't step up.

It's a shame we left it until the last day to really push for them. I don't get the argument that on the last day players are cheaper as more often than not the team selling but the prices up.

 

[AntiUnited]

The reason we lost this game is simple No kun, and more importantly no fernan he just showed why hes the teams MVP and most integral component in the whole squad. without him = we looked like a totally different side.. That being said Like i mentioned before This match was a must not lose for Chelsea and a potential kill them off for us = we are still the front runners for the title. So chill it was pretty embarrassing reading some of the post on the match thread.

 

[Ducado]

We win some we lose some we move on pretty poor game all in all

 

[Blueband Brother]

Now the dust has settled a wee bit, this is my take on last night.

Injuries
I have to say that yesterday was very frustrating and disappointing particularly with regards to injuries or the timing of the injuries. This is an issue that has to be raised and focused on by the club because it may be a very detrimental to our prospects this season. The club really needs to look into it. Fernandinho's was one injury to much and with Garcia out as well it was a major blow indeed.

Players
I don't know what happened to the players but their attitude was strange in the game. There wasn't really much fight and desire in their performance and some players in particular were non existent. Silva is a player I trust because he always gives 100% and that was the case today but his mental composure when in goal scoring situations is once again called into question. But he had a good enough game. Zabaleta was not himself today, very poor. Kolarov was our biggest threat going forward but looked fairly uninterested when it comes to defending.defending. Dimechelis, yes played midfield for bayern but that was gazillion years ago and he simply does not have the legs to be competent in that position especially against this new athletic chelsea midfied. I have to say that he did make some good eye catching tackles but much more is required from a midfield player and I think the manager should shelf this option and use him only as a defender.

Yaya was involved in most of our offensive plays but he struggled to handle the chelsea midfield by himself. Navas was lively so cannot really fault his approach. The center backs did fairly well but were put under unfair pressure because of the way chelsea broke out on us.

The strikers were the biggest let down in this match. In a game were we lacked personnel in the center, I expected one of them to drop deep and get involved in the play but they both stayed upfront and was invincible for most of the game. Dzeko was in soft-head-finishing mode today which was unfortunate and Negredo, well, I don't know what happened to him. It was Jovetic that actually showed what one of the other strikers should have done, when he came on. He dropped deep, linked up play and tried to make something happen,

Jovetic was a big positive in this game.

Pellegrini.
It must be frustrating for him with the injuries but as I have said, he has to look at this problem with the rest of the staff and find out a way to at least reduce the frequency. Yesterday would not have enhanced his reputation as a tactician and his decison to play Dimechelis instead of Rodwell or Milner was glaringly decisive. I reckon he is still learning about the players. Not a good night for him.

Mourinho
Before the start of the season a lot of pundits and fans alike identified Mourinho was the decisive factor in the title race. I think today was one of those trademark classic Mourinho nights where he displayed his worth as a pragmatic tactical genius. It was truly a masterclass from him and sometimes you just have to tip your hat and say well done Sir. His team played well and did their jobs with admirable diligence and efficiency.

But I just wish the city team was a bit close to full strength then it certainly would have been a different story. Personally I would have preferred to lose to a Sunderland or a Cardiff at home as It could have been chalked off as a one off fluke result. But being shut down and losing to Chelsea in such a big game of such significance was very painful indeed.

Nonetheless, the race continues, the team should recover and forget this bad night at the office and push on. We are still in four competitions and second in the league so our situation is very good. But the injury thing is a sinister haunting shadow that does not want to go away. Hope it does not screw this season up for us.

 

[Ducado]

We win some we lose some we move on pretty poor game all in all

 

[shasank]

i don't understand why did we play such a team ..??