Story of the season. No vehicle of spirit, honesty and determination to win or to want to win. Numerous opportunities to close the gap but the players have CHOSEN and that is the operative word chosen to shrink away. I could go all over the place as to reasons why this is the case but the bottom line is that after all these years coupled with the fact that these players has been in the club for a number of years it is decidedly surprising and disappointing that they cannot lift themselves and WANT to win. The manager has a lot of responsibility as well to motivate the players but the players should be able to motivate themselves and go get it.
Still retain that we have the best team in the league in terms of quality and if you really review the season so far and look at how things materialized in games, we could easily, easily be 10 points or even more better off... easily if the players really wanted it and it is a serious serious indictment on the state of the team. and the ultimate failure if a team like that nonchalantly throw away another great opportunity to win the premier league.
This is ever so important and worrying because these players are not getting any younger and such players are really difficult to replace. It is such a shame that the players did not really appreciate this season as another opportunity to attain success.
You might say typical City and so on but it all comes down to the player and the manager.
Pellegrini was poor today, Yaya was poor and that was the key AND like the Chelsea game, at Stamford Bridge, a game I still hold as one of the most disappointing if not the most disappointing game of the season, we just went through the motions- no urgency, no desire to take initiative and go on the front foot. We always seem to be waiting for the other team to score before we start going.... This should not be happening, not at this point. So yes, that Chelsea game was disappointing because the opponent was all over the place but our players did not want to smell the blood and pounce. Today was the same, yes, the manager made some poor substitutions but the players were just going through the motions until Coutinho scored then all of a sudden there is some fake urgency.
It is obviously not over but if we don't win the league or at least go close, this season would have been nothing but a failure. I had a lot of optimism going into this game but the outcome show a reality that I wish could just go away.