Some good and justified points.I get were you are coming from when you highlight the Barcelona obsession however we have followed that path and it has been very successful.
This is the identity of the club now. We will buy players to suit the roles needed within peps system. This will include a dm of either gundo or Rodri similar to Busquets as you have pointed out.
Lb- we need to give a fit mendy a chance.
Cb- granted we have tried and failed to replace vinny.
Garcia - agree
Going into the season we have nothing to fear re wolves and Leicester. The team is good enough to beat both.
The new opinion is that football has moved on from Pep’s system. Bayern and Liverpool are often used as an example.
The players need to get back to winning matches. Simple passes made, cut out silly mistakes, pass out from the back accurately and press from the front.
Buying a shiny new player is only half the battle. We have bought some very sought after talent but some have just not worked out for a lot of reasons.
I agree in part with both.
What I find really frustrating with the present City & Pep, is that we have a kind of arrogance with personnel.
It's like 'proper' defending & general athleticism is for lesser mortals. We have our super brilliant enlightened way of doing things which means we can play midfielders in defence & strollers in def mid & 'look we got 100 points so it's right'.
No, we got 100 points IN SPITE of it.
If we'd fixed those weaknesses, we'd maybe have another 100 points last season & maybe a few Champions Leagues.
The antidote to Pep's football, is better defending, workrate, pace, counter attacking. The challenge from Liverpool & Bayern is basically higher intensity & more variety of goals etc. In Liverpool's case corners etc in particular.
Pep can still run rings round all of them.
Anything they can do, Pep can do at City, without having to change his style at all, just add more variety in the final 3rd & fitter, quicker, specialist personnel, in a few positions.
It does my head in, that he doesn't seem to be arsed about doing it, so if we win through, we will do it with a handicap, again, rather than with a team with square pegs in square holes.