Has it been a good/poor season?

Piss poor season but people should be prepared that due to the short turnover to next season we will probably carry on with this form.
 
It’s been a good season. Another trophy in the cabinet, runners up in the league, good cup runs and the last English team in the champions league. Some absolute tonkings handed out to.

But it’s been well down by our recent standards, which are extremely high.
 
Rascal said:
Has it been a poor season, a good season or an average season.

2nd in the league to a better team
Won the League Cup
FA Cup semi finalists
CL QF

On our day we are magnificent, but we have too many off days and on those days we don't grind out results we find ways to lose. Often we lose even though we have dominated games, created loaded of chances, missed loads of opportunities and been punished for our mistakes.
Last night was typical of our season, we were profligate again and got punished again. We were In the ascendency and Jesus and Sterling missed great opportunities, Lyon pump a ball forward and score on the break just like so many other times this season. Then Ederson fucks up and its game over. Football at the very top is very fine margins, we are an elite team and against other good teams it can happen. Its frustrating because we know we can be so much better. No football team has ever been perfect, because in football perfection is impossible and I think Pep's drive for perfection is actually a hinderance because its an unachievable aim. He is a footballing romantic brought up believing in the football of Cruyff. yet the football of Cruyff's Holland team whilst being magical and sublime never achieved winning the world cup because it lacked the pragmatism of Argentina and West Germany at that time.

It then becomes a question of principle, does he sacrifice his principles and be pragmatic or does he stick with what he believes, I think as fans we would like to see more pragmatism, but when he is pragmatic like last night when he alters the team to deal with an opponent we call for him to stick with his beliefs and play like we have done over the last few years. The key is finding a mix between pragmatism and principle.

We also have to accept that football is inherently a game of mistakes, every goal comes from a mistake because the perfect game of football would end 0-0 and it is the capacity of football to be prone to mistakes that makes it such a fascinating sport. You can be the most wonderfully gifted team on the planet but lose because of one mistake to a team that on paper shouldn't even be in the same league.

If you accept football is a game of mistakes then what you do is either try to eliminate the mistakes or take advantage of the other teams mistakes and that is where footballing philosophies come into play. The high press is used to create mistakes by the opposition, but it leaves you prone to mistakes at the back because you are invariably undermanned, the low block aims to eliminate mistakes at the back but means you have less mistakes upfront to capitalise on. You only have 10 players to decide which way you wish to approach the game and last night we were caught in the middle of being principled and pragmatic but it was mistakes that cost us because whatever approach you take its always mistakes that settle the game.

Can you eliminate mistakes? to a point yes I think you can but you cant eliminate every mistake and not every mistakes is taken advantage off because the other team makes mistakes too. Case in point is we induced mistakes from Lyon to create an open goal for Sterling who then somehow managed to balloon it over the bar. None of this was done on purpose its football and its why its so fascinating because it exposes human frailties and reminds us all of the time we also ballooned a great chance over from 5 yards out playing against the Dog and Duck third eleven.

I thought I would have a look at some stats for some seasons

Mancini title F93 A29 L5

Pellers Title F102 A37 L6

Pep title F106 A27 L2

last season F102 A35 L9

There is remarkably not much difference between the stats for any of those years apart from one obvious one, somehow we contrived to lose 9 games last season despite the stats not being that much different.

Conclusion is last season we got punished far more for our mistakes than in the other seasons, shit happens

I fucking love City, only us could beat the Spanish champions and CL KIngs and then lose to a team who finished 7th in the French Farmers league.

Don't ever change City.
Click to expand...

Excellent post Rascal. We'll be back in September stronger than this season and those small margins will be addressed.
 
It's been a poor season based on our current standards, although not without mitigating circumstances. Not replacing Kompany was idiotic which was then compounded when Laporte was injured. Liverpool's relentlessness and points accumulation finished the league in December and the off field issues can't have helped.

But getting knocked out in the QF by Lyon with that starting 11 there are absolutely no excuses. We got exactly what we deserved and not for the first time we beat ourselves in a CL knockout game.
 
I think the men in charge think it's a poor season, Miles off the title race and, knocked out the way we did in the CL does not meet the standard they like.
Comparing City today to the City 30 years ago is not the right thing to do, the bar is not set at the same level.
 
Rascal said:
Has it been a poor season, a good season or an average season.

2nd in the league to a better team
Won the League Cup
FA Cup semi finalists
CL QF

On our day we are magnificent, but we have too many off days and on those days we don't grind out results we find ways to lose. Often we lose even though we have dominated games, created loaded of chances, missed loads of opportunities and been punished for our mistakes.
Last night was typical of our season, we were profligate again and got punished again. We were In the ascendency and Jesus and Sterling missed great opportunities, Lyon pump a ball forward and score on the break just like so many other times this season. Then Ederson fucks up and its game over. Football at the very top is very fine margins, we are an elite team and against other good teams it can happen. Its frustrating because we know we can be so much better. No football team has ever been perfect, because in football perfection is impossible and I think Pep's drive for perfection is actually a hinderance because its an unachievable aim. He is a footballing romantic brought up believing in the football of Cruyff. yet the football of Cruyff's Holland team whilst being magical and sublime never achieved winning the world cup because it lacked the pragmatism of Argentina and West Germany at that time.

It then becomes a question of principle, does he sacrifice his principles and be pragmatic or does he stick with what he believes, I think as fans we would like to see more pragmatism, but when he is pragmatic like last night when he alters the team to deal with an opponent we call for him to stick with his beliefs and play like we have done over the last few years. The key is finding a mix between pragmatism and principle.

We also have to accept that football is inherently a game of mistakes, every goal comes from a mistake because the perfect game of football would end 0-0 and it is the capacity of football to be prone to mistakes that makes it such a fascinating sport. You can be the most wonderfully gifted team on the planet but lose because of one mistake to a team that on paper shouldn't even be in the same league.

If you accept football is a game of mistakes then what you do is either try to eliminate the mistakes or take advantage of the other teams mistakes and that is where footballing philosophies come into play. The high press is used to create mistakes by the opposition, but it leaves you prone to mistakes at the back because you are invariably undermanned, the low block aims to eliminate mistakes at the back but means you have less mistakes upfront to capitalise on. You only have 10 players to decide which way you wish to approach the game and last night we were caught in the middle of being principled and pragmatic but it was mistakes that cost us because whatever approach you take its always mistakes that settle the game.

Can you eliminate mistakes? to a point yes I think you can but you cant eliminate every mistake and not every mistakes is taken advantage off because the other team makes mistakes too. Case in point is we induced mistakes from Lyon to create an open goal for Sterling who then somehow managed to balloon it over the bar. None of this was done on purpose its football and its why its so fascinating because it exposes human frailties and reminds us all of the time we also ballooned a great chance over from 5 yards out playing against the Dog and Duck third eleven.

I thought I would have a look at some stats for some seasons

Mancini title F93 A29 L5

Pellers Title F102 A37 L6

Pep title F106 A27 L2

last season F102 A35 L9

There is remarkably not much difference between the stats for any of those years apart from one obvious one, somehow we contrived to lose 9 games last season despite the stats not being that much different.

Conclusion is last season we got punished far more for our mistakes than in the other seasons, shit happens

I fucking love City, only us could beat the Spanish champions and CL KIngs and then lose to a team who finished 7th in the French Farmers league.

Don't ever change City.
Click to expand...
What those stats show is that teams have adapted to our gameplan. They are exploiting our weaknesses.
Fair play, it happens. If Pep does not re-adapt to this change the game will overtake him, as it has done with Jose.
Time to evolve or face extinction.
 
We are the richest club in the world, it sets a standard but money doesn't buy you everything. It's not like were in a dramatic position, but there seems a need for some tooling at various levels to improve performance.

You have to hand it to the Bayern though ... they can make the diference by work ethic and efficient team football. It's hardly such a advantage in the CL to have so many star players if the opposition tends to do aswell, everyone wants to win and there are plenty of good candidates, things like team cohesion and determination seem to play a larger role.
 
For me good season, although double figures in terms of loses(League and Cup)with a team as strong as ours is worrying we seem to be way too fragile, if you look at Mancini and the team he built the thing that stood out was we became hard to beat, this City side that overall is a much "better" team doesn't have that solid base
 
Its been poor by recent standards of course and the team has taken on a look of being jaded at times.

Best solution is for the club to assure Pep of getting in his targets as early as possible and Pep to assure the club by signing an extension. We can start that process today.

After what has been achieved over recent years and the loyalty shown by the manager over the uefa ban talk of sacking him is ridiculous.

We may have to accept we are not going to win the CL with pep. I've accepted it as I despise the competition. It Is bent and the organisation that runs it is corrupt.

I'm much more bothered about winning the league or fa Cup and he has a very good record there.

He stood behind us in our darkest time. Time for us to stand behind him.
 
How many games have we lost?

Over 10 then it has been a poor season by our previous standards, it is no good saying well it is better than being in division 2, we have moved on a tad since those dark days.

I am unsure why you say
Rascal said:
'It then becomes a question of principle, does he sacrifice his principles and be pragmatic or does he stick with what he believes'
Click to expand...

This is the very thing he is doing in the CL, he changes our lovely attacking football into some turgid game of chess, inevitably we miss chances and concede off the first real chance given, this is being pragmatic.

Fernie, Rodri and Gundy in the middle?

KDB false 9?

Why?

Just go out and play our brand of attacking football.

Going 3 at the back was a huge error, not changing anything at half time was just being stubborn, it wasted another 10 minutes of the second half.

Not even playing the guy that played your tactics to perfection v Real Madrid was borderline criminal.
 
We've been the nearly team this season in most cases, but honestly to expect the level of last season or higher was always going to be tough. A couple of key injuries and we struggled, and our lack of investment in certain areas was exposed. At times we've been sublime, but at others we've been lost and reactionary. We've had games where we've looked confused, unconfident, and, worst of all for us, lacking different opinions going forward. This is the side that previously could expose you to Sane's raw pace, keep you guessing which wing Sterling would pop up on, pop a ball over the top to counter a counter, cut inside with Mahrez or Bernie or just pass through the centre with KDB, David Silva and all. We've not had that, and I firmly believe that just having that ability puts uncertainty into a opponents team sheet and tactcs before a ball is even kicked. Hopefully Torres is a step towards fixing that.

As posted above by others, the number of league games lost is unacceptable. Lyon was unacceptable. Arsenal was unacceptable. Not the fact we failed, but the manner in which we failed.

But that's who we are, we've been so good for the past two seasons that this feels a bit of a backwards step. The challenge was to be as good again, if not better by progressing in Europe, and by that standard we've failed.

Good points are the majority of the performances, the playing style, number of goals scored, Sterling, Kev and the league cup. Plus of course Foden. More than enough to show there is still a basis of a very, very good team there.

That said, there is work to be done to ensure it is not the start of a slide, you'd say we've for far too much about us to let that happen but similarly a team like ours needs to be challenging at the top continually to get that extra out of us. Next year will be even harder. Chelsea looks a threat with their additions, United seem to have been earmarked for the favour of VAR already, and like a persistent fart Liverpool will linger. Hopefully we so things right and regain the title, but the top 4 will be competitive.

The recruitment this summer is key not just for next season but for the next few. If Pep does make this his last season then we need to know, need to have plans on place for succession and need to bring in players flexible enough for the new guy. If he extends, great, but we need to be clear on what is expected and how we should go about achieving it together. Be it new players, different tactics or coaching.

I think what makes it worse is that this season has just been so overshadowed by things so awful, and punctuated by further irritations. From the absolute horror that is Covid-19, decimating lives and livelihoods, the absolute joke that has been the implementation of VAR, the farce of the FFP case, to a league-winning Liverpool, the only team alongside the raggies who are less gracious in victory than in defeat and deem it more important to put down others rather than celebrate their own, I for one welcome the break and like all hope we use the opportunity to regroup, strengthen and regain our appetite to show we are the best in England.
 
If at the start of the Season we’d planned coming a poor 2nd in the league, exiting the FA Cup in the semis to a very average Arsenal. 9 defeats , lost derbies , failure in the Champions KO stages again but beating Villa in the league cup I suspect we’d have fell about laughing.
 
12 defeats including home/away Vs wolves, 3 against the rags and Norwich one of the worst teams in PL history. Add in 5 draws. 17 matches. An absolutely shite season and imo an utter disgrace for the money we've invested. We have one fit striker, how can we be so light in a key position?? Our left backs continue to be terrible, we've 3 centrebacks who aren't up to it and we're bas slow as fuck in midfield. A shambles of a season. And before the "back when we were shit" brigade start, I don't want to hear it, those days are gone and by our current standards/financial position this season has been a farce.
 
Poor

5 new players in the summer won't fix it. We've an ageing team and some players bought recently who arent good enough.
 
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