Everton (H) | Post Match Thread

[DWIFF]

Really poor performance.
Lack of pace out wide is costing us.
Back to basics for the Chelsea game please. Time for a proper back four and Alvarez and Foden to come back in.
Arsenal look really strong and I don’t see them dropping many points. By the time we meet in Feb, I think they will be 15 points ahead. Hope I’m wrong. In Pep we trust.

 

[City_Sean]

Don't know why I bothered but I rewatched the game, and it reinforced the fact that we've actually become pretty boring to watch this season.

Our entire philosophy this season seems to be about keeping the ball but not actually doing anything with it. It's tedious how often Mahrez and Grealish get the ball and pass it sideways.

The fact Pep didn't make changes till so late is either indication that he thinks it's working or he doesn't rate the quality on the bench. Both are a huge concern.

 

[Vester]

Am a bit annoyed about the comments from Pep and several players after the game. First I assumed what Pep said in public and behind closed doors is two different things, but when several players say the same it seems like they actually think they delivered a stellar performance yesterday and was just insanely unlucky. "We played a great game and they scored on their only shot etc". The problem is not us conceding 1 goal from 1 shot, that happens. The problem is obviously us only scoring once against one of the worst teams in the league at home, when we should be scoring 5 or 6. Sure we could have won this game, and probably deserved to win. But we should be creating 2-3 times the amount of good chances that we did, especially when we are chasing a result. That the team seem to have the mindset that "we created enough, it was just not our day" is a bit worrying. Unfortunately this years City is not as good as recent years, so far at least. Hopefully we get our act together on the second half of the season, we need a miracle to win the league now but there is 3 other trophies to compete for as well. And sometimes miracles do happen!

 

[OB1]

They don’t, but that’s because other sides haven't been Champion's 4 seasons out of the last 5. We only really play one way too so easier to defend against when we have an off day. Other sides use the ball over the top more and rely on pace from time to time when other stuff isn’t working. We probably need some quicker players to complement Haaland.

I can't be definitive because how much I watch of other sides varies considerably but in all my long years of watching City / football, the parade of bus parkers that City face feels unprecedented. I know in recent times I've bemoaned how teams play against the Scousers compared to us. Of course, Liverpool don't play exactly the same way as us but I felt teams could have made it harder for them.

I don't think pace is really the answer when teams sit deep in large numbers. Running into a brick wall at speed just hurts more ;-) A player with world class trickery and serious pace might open up some more chances but we've seen Sane struggle against teams defending low in numbers.

Playing the ball over the top only really works if your opponent defends high. That said, I do think we need to look for opportunities to knock things over the top for Haaland to chase; teams don't want to let us do that though....

Forwards with pace come into their own when you can counter attack and we really aren't bad at that as we stand: only the Rags have scored more goals on the counter than we have so far this season. We aren't going to sit back though and try to draw teams out.

Dealing with opponents counter-attacking his teams has been a perenial conundrum for Pep and he keeps trying to tune things to reduce it happening but within his way of playing. Yesterday, we had the players there to control the counter Everton scored from but they contrived (and may have been fooled by imcompetence or brilliance on Gray's part) to give him too much space to pick out the top corner.

We've added the big, fast goal machine and he scored (again) yesterday and gave us the lead; notwithstanding we were less than the width of the post from a 2-0 lead, we have to make sure we can win games by 1-0. and that means not errors in the wrong places.

I would like some pace in the team but it has to come with top class technical ability and high football intelligence.

 

[HelloCity]

Don't know why I bothered but I rewatched the game, and it reinforced the fact that we've actually become pretty boring to watch this season.

Our entire philosophy this season seems to be about keeping the ball but not actually doing anything with it. It's tedious how often Mahrez and Grealish get the ball and pass it sideways.

The fact Pep didn't make changes till so late is either indication that he thinks it's working or he doesn't rate the quality on the bench. Both are a huge concern.

The line up is the easy answer. If Grealish and Mahrez start then, for the most part, we’re never going to be as electric going forward.

Not only that but you could argue that not one player from that back four would make our strongest XI. Maybe Ake on form but definitely not at left back. He can’t do anything going forward which is unbalancing the side.

The solution? Play our better players where possible. If the CL final was tomorrow, what would your side be? I bet it would have at least 5 players different than yesterday.

 

[Dave Ewing's Back 'eader]

We knew from the off how this game would pan out, from the first minute of Haaland being targeted the whole match was choreographed by MADley and the blue dippers. Cynical dark arts by Everton and Madley doing his Blind Pew impersonation, that was until City put a challenge in, then all of a sudden he had the eyes of a shithouse rat, albeit a sken eyed one. All getting a little too obvious.

I might have a pair of blue-tinted prescription lenses but from where I sit the whistling wanker gave me more than an impression that he was gonna blunt our attacking threat. Did we actually get a free kick for the first minute assault on Haarland? From what I remember play just carried on. When players know they've been fouled and the perpetrators see that they've been given a carte blanche nod from the ref it's not a bit of wonder that players will attempt to apply their own LotG. Unfortunately, there hasn't been a ref since we moved to The Etihad that hasn't seen every example of a sky blue misdemeanour. How many times do our players get chopped, clattered, or completely taken out of the move, react at the nastiness of the 'tackle' and the ref delivers strong officiating by booking both players! Shit reffing is the only way to adequately describe it. And just how many times was the pillock in the way? At one point it would have been appropriate to be wearing a pink shirt.

 

[Asa's left peg]

Just watched the incident with Godfrey, back. If that's premeditated and done deliberately (I've seen it done before) then it's a cowards trick and should be punished. I don't see any glance down by Godfrey, before taking off to compete for the header (that was a foul), so I think it was an unlucky event - but also lucky it wasn't worse!

 

[Eoiyflem]

Arsenal haven’t had a dip yet.. they will. Whether we can capitalise on it or not is another matter.. but tons of football to be played and if we find our form I think we could be back within a few points.. come mid February.

3 months of a fantastic experienced side breathing down the necks of a young talented side who have yet to win a bean will be a huge test of their character.

The issue is, we aren't breathing down their necks unfortunately mate, we're losing ground. We've dropped points to villa, Brentford and Everton. Not good enough at the moment to credibly mount a title charge, particularly when you look at our next 7 games.

I really hope we suddenly kick into gear but we haven't looked like it all season, even the Fulham game at home was woeful and we got incredibly lucky.

We've dropped 12 points in 16 games, let's say we improve and drop 10 from the remaining 22. We would still need arsenal to lose 6 of their remaining games, even with a dip that's a tall order.

I'm a bit more worried that the rags and dippers are hitting a bit of form tbh, although we will obviously maintain top 4 I just don't see us winning the league from here based on the season performances to date, it is what it is.

We need a change of formation and personnel ASAP to have a chance. Stop conceded a goal per game is also a must. Foden, cancelo (on form), laporte, walker, Alvarez need to be playing, end of story.

We can't win it every year at the end of the day, but something genuinely has to fundamentally change immediately if we want to have any sniff

 

[City_Sean]

The line up is the easy answer. If Grealish and Mahrez start then, for the most part, we’re never going to be as electric going forward.

Not only that but you could argue that not one player from that back four would make our strongest XI. Maybe Ake on form but definitely not at left back. He can’t do anything going forward which is unbalancing the side.

The solution? Play our better players where possible. If the CL final was tomorrow, what would your side be? I bet it would have at least 5 players different than yesterday.

If the Champions League final was tomorrow my XI would be:

Ederson
Walker Stones Dias Cancelo
Bernardo Rodri KDB
Alvarez Haaland Foden

The issue is that Pep would opt for something like:

Ederson
Walker Akanji Laporte Ake
Gundogan Rodri KDB
Bernardo Haaland Grealish

 

[City Raider]

Time to stop messing about with Foden. Get him in the middle so the whole pitch is opened up to his creativity.