Discuss Pellegrini (Pt 3)

[BlueRockape]

The problem is that the one that the rags ended up with is above us in the league (with an arguably poorer team) which has got to be a problem for Pellegrini. Can this be turned around ? I hope so and I believe so. There's no point in pretending though that overall 8th place is a poor start. Our get out of jail card lies in the fact that no one else is running away with the league - that's good luck on our part.

I don't think you can call it good luck, more a total reality of the entire league this season.

Everton have lost just once this season, to ourselves. We have lost four and sit one point behind them. There has to be a correlation between some of our results and the fact United and Chelsea have also experienced poor results against teams previously considered cannon-fodder?

One team won the league by 12 points last year, the other, another European trophy, having recruited top players the previous summer, and who also spent an additional £60m this time around, with Mourinho at the helm.

All three teams changed manager, so allowances have obviously been made.

Moyes and Mourinho have vast experience of the English league, yet plenty don't wish to afford Pellegrini any type of slack whatsoever after 11 games, sitting a couple of points behind both.

I don’t really buy into comparing pellegrini with moyes or mourinho or whoever – it’s futile.
What i’m looking at is city’s performances because that’s all that pellegrini can control – and in my opinion he has dropped some real clangers so far. Couple of games he’s been tactically great but in quite a few games his tactics and team selection have really worried me.

I hope he gets it right and he’s got to be given more than 11 games but this is modern football and you don’t get the luxury of time. He’s made a poor start there can be no denying it – he’s got to get it right very, very quickly now or the league season will be over before Christmas.

It’s hard for a manager to come into a new league and adapt straight away – but at the end of the day that’s the job he’s taken on and he has to be judged accordingly. So far you can’t come to any other conclusion than it’s been a very poor start.

Great post

 

[casualdeyna]

After reading some of this and the "clueless manager" thread I thought I'd give my two penny worth.

Regardless of how good or bad a manager you think Pellegrini is we have to give him a few years in the job, unless we finish outside of top four as with FFP it is a real problem if that happens, for us especially. So Pellegrini has to figure out where it is going wrong on the road as this current form is no better than mid-table.

The thing that worries me and has all season is how vunerable we are to a long ball over the top. I've lost count now how many times we've conceded or nearly conceded from nothing more than a hoof over the top, even Chelsea with Hart's blunder was another long ball, same at Villa, at CSKA, same yesterday. It's basic defending (like defending a corner as we didn't do at Cardiff) and we can't be getting the basics wrong all the time.

We can't play a high line if one ball over the top is causing so many problems, so we'll have to sit deeper especially without Kompany or some pace at the back, it will mean we'll get pushed back and teams will play on the edge of our area a lot more but better that than have players like Bardsley clean through.

Going forward we were shocking yesterday but giving teams at the bottom a goal head start is only going to result in them putting everyone behind the ball and make it even more difficult for us. If we could at least do the basics right and keep a clean sheet we may nick a goal and open the game up, even a point away from home isn't a bad result, but we need to learn from our mistakes and not just keep hoping that the away form will sort itself out, we need to keep a few clean sheets on the road and the form should come from there, giving such simple goals away all the time is only making the problem worse.

 

[George Hannah]

As others have said. It's a simple equation...
Top 4 finish = Mancini stays...
Finish outside the top 4 = Mourinho in the summer...
I'd be happy with either scenario...

I believe we finished 5th that season Billy and I really think it ill behoves you to juxtapose other people's opinions when responding to my posts.

As I said it's a shame you have to lie and squirm like like teenage boy because you haven't got anywhere else to go. The relevant part of my post which you've dug up would be "I'd be happy with either scenario". I could've saved you the trouble of going hunting. You said I wanted Mancini gone within hours of him being appointed. Patently not the case.

I defer of course to your experience of squirming teenage boys but clearly you gave Mancini half a season to avoid the axe. Bit of a contrast to the 18 month minimum you expect Manuel to get.

 

[franksinatra]

If it was a huge error who do you think they should've appointed? (genuine question btw, i'm not trying to start an argument!)

Genuine answer... it's a difficult one because it's now clear that any of the ones I'd have really wanted weren't really available. Mourinho, Klopp, Pep, all would have been fantastic.

At the risk of being battered on here, & with none of those available I'd have preferred us to go for Rafa :-O

Without wanting to rehash the old debate, I think a young, energetic progressive Manager (Laudrup, De Boer) could have worked. I am also sure Rafa would have succeeded (but not with the regime in place).

I think Southampton have shown the way. Their young Manager has been a fantastic success so far.

I was a huge Mancini fan and although I was disappointed with elements of last season I thought his record over the last couple of seasons, the improvements at the club, gave me faith over the close season he would be able to tweak the team over the summer and we would be able to return to the form of the Championship winning season. I mean we had not dropped out of the top three for nearly three years so the improvements were only cosmetic in nature as we have, and have got, a very good team.

However if we were to bring in a new manager, which with a heavy heart I would reluctantly accept, I would have expected a manager with either a proven track record such as a Klopp or a young manager although low on trophies with a profile suggesting he was going to be the next big thing in management such as Simeone. For me the strange thing about the appointment of Pellegrini he ticked neither of these boxes and so you wonder how he could be considered an upgrade on a manager who has won trophies for four clubs in two of the four most competitive leagues in Europe.

A Klopp or Simeone would have softened the blow and in some ways would have given the club a bit of a lift. after a disappointing finish to last season. However with the appointment of Pellegrini, his interviews, demeanour, team performances, the initial lift when appointing a new manager has not been forthcoming.

Still we have appointed him and I think he deserves at least a full season to implement his ideas on the team.

 

[kenzie115]

Re: Clueless manager

Before taking the OP too seriously it may be worth considering these previous posts (about Negredo):

15-Aug

Spains answer to Ricky Lambert

16-Sep

Spanish Grant Holt and Jovetich is like Berbatov on sleeping tablets

03-Oct

I don't get this Negredo being quality and all his movement is class ( I know he plays for Spain) He's an impact player at most much too static for me

A knee jerker of epic proportions.

As for the clueless manager, his changes actually made a difference, bringing Navas on, and later Zab, made us much more threatening down the right hand side and had we had more players in the box we might have had a chance of scoring. Richards was shocking yesterday and it was the right decision to replace him.

As for the initial selections, many would argue Kolarov has been our best left back this season so you can't really argue with that. Richards annd Zabaleta have rotated in the last few games with decent results and Sunderland's aerial threat means Richards wasn't a stupid selection. Lescott was the only choice at centre half. Navas hasn't been in great form recently and so Milner's industry and fight was probably selected as a better option, plus he could cover for Richards who tends to take a while to track back. Fernandinho was injured and with Rodwell's fitness a doubt playing Garcia becomes the only option once you'd picked Milner out wide.

 

[Danielmanc]

Now let me preface this by saying that I rate Rafa very highly, and have done since long before the football hipsters cottoned on to how good a coach he was. The problem with him getting the City job, and it's a wider and more relevant discussion than most people realise, is what did the owners want?

Broadly speaking when you look across the top coaches in Europe you have two kinds ... you have those who don't believe in playing percentages and play every game from minute one to minute 90 in pretty much the same attacking way (Pep, Klopp, Pellegrini), and you have those who are more pragmatic for want of a better word (Benitez, Mancini, Mourinho).

Strikes me that the owners made a conscious decision to employ Txiki and Ferran which means that they wanted a certain attacking philosophy. This obviously has meant a change in emphasis from when Mancini was in charge and yes it's meant we are more open. But what can you do when it's the choice the owners made? If they wanted that kind of coach, Pellegrini was the best available on the market this summer. Klopp has all but said City tried to get him. Pep was already in Munich. When you look at who the rags ended up with, who PSG ended up with, I'm very happy we got Pellegrini. But then I rate the guy and believe he'll be a success.

The problem is that the one that the rags ended up with is above us in the league (with an arguably poorer team) which has got to be a problem for Pellegrini. Can this be turned around ? I hope so and I believe so. There's no point in pretending though that overall 8th place is a poor start. Our get out of jail card lies in the fact that no one else is running away with the league - that's good luck on our part.

We've made a disappointing start in terms of the points haul away from home. I consider that points haul does not reflect the overall quality of the performances, the reasons for taking such a view are well documented by numerous people, and you can either agree or disagree. However, the point Billy makes about the choice made by the club, to go with an attacking manager, is hard to disagree with.

Attack should actually be the best form of defence; especially in our case, as we are conceding the fewest shots at goal. The next three teams in that ranking just happen to have the three best defensive records in the league. If we keep the shots against us at the current levels, it would be very strange indeed not to produce a very significant improvement in our defensive record.

I do really hope that it can improve as you predict OB1, I really do. I guess the next two aways against The Saints and WBA will tell us something.

 

[BlueRockape]

My worst fear is if this continues we will lose some of our better players at the end of the season, rather than get rid problems now.

 

[franksinatra]

Genuine answer... it's a difficult one because it's now clear that any of the ones I'd have really wanted weren't really available. Mourinho, Klopp, Pep, all would have been fantastic.

At the risk of being battered on here, & with none of those available I'd have preferred us to go for Rafa :-O

Without wanting to rehash the old debate, I think a young, energetic progressive Manager (Laudrup, De Boer) could have worked. I am also sure Rafa would have succeeded (but not with the regime in place).

I think Southampton have shown the way. Their young Manager has been a fantastic success so far.

I was a huge Mancini fan and although I was disappointed with elements of last season I thought his record over the last couple of seasons, the improvements at the club, gave me faith over the close season he would be able to tweak the team over the summer and we would be able to return to the form of the Championship winning season. I mean we had not dropped out of the top three for nearly three years so the improvements were only cosmetic in nature as we have, and have got, a very good team.

However if we were to bring in a new manager, which with a heavy heart I would reluctantly accept, I would have expected a manager with either a proven track record such as a Klopp or a young manager although low on trophies with a profile suggesting he was going to be the next big thing in management such as Simeone. For me the strange thing about the appointment of Pellegrini he ticked neither of these boxes and so you wonder how he could be considered an upgrade on a manager who has won trophies for four clubs in two of the four most competitive leagues in Europe.

A Klopp or Simeone would have softened the blow and in some ways would have given the club a bit of a lift. after a disappointing finish to last season. However with the appointment of Pellegrini, his interviews, demeanour, team performances, the initial lift when appointing a new manager has not been forthcoming.

Still we have appointed him and I think he deserves at least a full season to implement his ideas on the team. I do not think he is clueless or his tactics or particularly bad but his choice of personnel has been suspect. Once the injuries have cleared up I still think we will have a successful season.

 

[lancs blue]

Pellegrini really is getting a seriously raw deal from some on here.

I've seen 'clueless', 'clown', 'yes man', that's more character assassination than managerial critique?

A guy who flew home to Chile to attend the funeral of his mother and flew back straight away for a meaningless friendly in the Far East.

I don't think anyone should be any doubt over his commitment to get it right. Question the ability to get it right, sure, but a lot of the comments still seem rooted in resentment rather than rationale?

We are also being let down by long-term offenders that even Mancini could not bring into line.

Every bit of this is spot fuckin on.

The manager has not been to 'blame' for any of the 4 defeats.

Errors, lack of concentration and in yesterday's case a completely vile lack of application and desire from the players.

This works the other way round as well.

After great performances and great results people come on here and give a slight nod to the manager 'getting it right'.

What 99% of you are missing on your analysis is that whether we hammer Norwich 7- 0 or utd 4-1 or lose to Sunderland or Cardiff, it's the players who deliver those performances and results not the manager. They are out there in the pitch doing what they do.

7-0 Norwich
4-1 utd
5-2 cska
2-1 cska
3-0 plzen
4-0 Newcastle
3-1 Everton
2-0 hull
3-1 west ham

8 wins, 33 goals scored, 6 conceded.

0-1 Sunderland
2-3 villa
2-3 Cardiff
1-2 Chelsea
1-3 Bayern

5 losses, 6 goals scored, 12 conceded.

That clearly points to a Jekyll and Hyde team mindset and lazy or arrogant or both approach to some games .

If some of you think all this is down to one man you are delusional beyond words.

It's the players. The top set of results proves that.. The bottom set of results confirms it beyond dispute.

Player errors, key injuries, lack of application and desire at times.

Not the manager.

Hang on, are you serious? It's up to the manager to sort out arrogant or lazy attitudes, it's up to the manager to get his team performing at the level required. It's up to the manager and coaching staff to reduce the number of errors that players make.

By your reasoning no manager would ever be sacked for poor results. As I said earlier I'm not after Pellegrini's head but he sure as hell has to share responsibility for the poor away results up to now.

 

[Kippax.]

Pellegrini has shown already hes the man to take city forward. The guy needs time, he has brought a great player in Negredo who came with no pedagree in my eyes as I never heard of him as a player in the same light as carvani or falcao. Hes transformed our forward line to the best, Aguero is now showing the potential we all expected which is a result of Pellegrini.

Fernandiniho is also a great signing, hes becoming more of the player I was expecting, hes started slow but now is showing true potential in midfield.

Our big problem is defence. Hart has shown at the moment to be a problem, which hasent helped our defence, hes cost us already a few point this season, this isnt Pellegrini's fault. Kompany, Richards being injured hasnt helped. Hes brought a steady player in Demichelis whos again starting to adapt to the Prem and looking at steady progress.

Pellegrini is getting a hard time, he needs time and if the results was the same with a fully strengh squad then I may have a different opinion. Yes hes made some strange desitions but hows he going to know his squad of players properly with out trying them in a leauge match?

Maybe this is why he gets a lot of respect from players because he showns them he gives a shit and gives them a oportunity to shine, unlike Mancini who was know to not even to speak to the players who wasnt in the 25 man squad.