NipHolmes said:
IBlue said:
I wouldn't say Barry's performances have dipped, still very consistent and professional, i would look at it differently that perhaps he is playing for an extended contract
Barry has been good but he's been shocking in a few selected games. Southampton was disgusting for instance.
To be brutally honest our English palyers are a level below top player level and whilst we field them we will always be lacking somewhat.
Lescott, Barry and Milner are all good players but none would get in Barca, Real, Bayern, Dortmund, Juventus etc.
All three are good players for us but all three need upgrading on. Of this there really is no denying.
Disagree.
I think all would get in a well organised side with one pattern of play, in fact Pep Guardiola actually singled out Barry as one of the City players he most admired (that's after dropping Yaya & selling him to us).
The problem comes when you ask players to do jobs they can't do. In Yaya's case, that's any kind of resposible defensive job for 90 mins, in Barry's case, it's chasing round after 2 or 3 younger, faster, fitter midfield players with little or no cover for 90 mins. (Yaya & Garcia amount to little or no cover).
The difference is, no matter how many times Yaya lets his man run off & score, it doesn't matter. If Barry (or Lescott or Milner) do it once, they are hung for it. That's the price of being an English player.
Mancini keeps changing formations, asking players to do different jobs & rather than going back to a problem & fixing it, he changes everything around, so the next time we play a similar team, the same problem arises because we never addressed it (Ajax' 1st goal was a mirror image of Cavani's 2nd for Napoli).
Barca, Dortmund, Bayern etc work on a system, get players to do their jobs & perfect it. Barry can clean up loose balls & nick the ball off players in the middle of a tight midfield better han Martinez but isn't given the same job or the same cover.