Manuel Pellegrini (cont)

[Gaylord du Bois]

Does anyone else feel that he doesn't seem able to grasp the concept of knockout football.
I know we had the Carling cup win but other than that...?

Haha. So basically he won a knock out competition without grasping what it takes to win one. Sure. Blessed/kissed with good luck.

I think you know what I'm saying, Billy. I'm struggling to work out, how, that when it comes to the knockout arena he comes up short. No Mancini agenda, just puzzlement. You know, just as people/fans may pass comment with each other that doesn't require an elongated essay about why they might feel that way.
Contrary to what your view from the ivory tower maybe, there's others out here that just happen to have a laymans approach to our thoughts on the game.
PS. Can't be arsed to preview my post before posting because I'm using a hand held device, but I'm sure you get the gist.

 

[Damanino]

Who could be the next big manager from the younger ones? We all know Guardiola, Mourinho, Ancelotti, they seem to be top 3, recently Simeone/Klopp joined them as younger/upcoming elite managers but who called this about Simeone/Klopp like around 2010.

Are there any real great talents with enough drive in them that we gonna talk about them around 2018-2019 like we talk about Simeone/Klopp etc.

Dont have to be exactly really young like but anywhere between 35-45. To me it seems like Italians are actually giving some chance to former players but then hardly turn out well most of the time, Seedorf(meh), Inzaghi(average), Montella(decent but lack of money to spend or improve), Conte(decent given where did Juve come back from ...) etc...

Just naming a few in the category I am talking, Frank de Boer(Ajax), Koeman(Soton), Cocu(PSV), Montella(Fiorentina), Garcia (Roma), Pochettino (Spurs), Martinez (Everton), Rodgers (Pool), Conte (Italy), Emery (Sevilla), Nuno Espirito Santo (Valencia), Luis Enrique (Barca), Di Matteo (Schalke) etc.

Some of them having good season, some of them had a great season recently. All of them are talented managers imo at good clubs, but probably most of them wont become really great. And even the likes of Simeone/Klopp has still lot more to prove and actually keep up the elite level even if their teams arent as rich as their rival. Unless they change clubs soon.

Its harder to tell about a manager that is he becoming great than about a player. The idea that we put everything into that we gonna get Pep after Pelle is something I dont like, I see him being a target for maybe even United/Arsenal in 1-2-3 years, so wouldnt be clear he chooses City, going back to home to Barca will always be an option for him, also he could just sign a new contract at Bayern I think it depends on what he does in CL with them this season.

So what if ends up somewhere else, do we just give a new contract to Pelle 2016 summer even if in 3 years he doesnt reach a qurter final in CL. Or do we go for maybe some younger talented one from above list or someone not mentioned, or do we chose from the very small list of Klopp/Simeone/ancelotti if they are available.
But Ancelotti might be available this summer, and might have another job until then. (Obviously Mourinho can be forgotten as an option.)

Btw PSG is probably thinking about Blanc too, what if they can get Pep in 2016. Now thats a real big question, and anything that we hope we have in Txiki as big friend of Pep would mean fuck all at that point. Would then we hire another "stopgap" until he finishes at PSG?

 

[BillyShears]

Does anyone else feel that he doesn't seem able to grasp the concept of knockout football.
I know we had the Carling cup win but other than that...?

Haha. So basically he won a knock out competition without grasping what it takes to win one. Sure. Blessed/kissed with good luck.

I think you know what I'm saying, Billy. I'm struggling to work out, how, that when it comes to the knockout arena he comes up short. No Mancini agenda, just puzzlement. You know, just as people/fans may pass comment with each other that doesn't require an elongated essay about why they might feel that way.
Contrary to what your view from the ivory tower maybe, there's others out here that just happen to have a laymans approach to our thoughts on the game.
PS. Can't be arsed to preview my post before posting because I'm using a hand held device, but I'm sure you get the gist.

Three times I've written a reply and every time I read it back and I feel you're dragging me down to your level. If you have a thought and you can't back it up you probably shouldn't be surprised when on a public forum someone challenges it.

 

[Mikejl]

I know he's a rag but good article from Higginbotham in the Indey today

It's been a week of carnage for the English teams in Europe and I have to say it’s been a week of ridiculous explanations for why things have gone wrong.

Explanations like “the Premier League is in decline” and “the Premier League players aren’t as good” or “the Premier League matters more to them”. All of which are categorically just not true.

The managers are, to a very large degree, the reason why Manchester City and Arsenal lost, with Liverpool and Tottenham eliminated. Quite simply, they got their tactics wrong, or dispensed with them altogether.

Recent history gives us a running story of teams who should never be near a Champions League trophy lifting one because their managers got the tactics right.

Jose Mourinho’s Porto should not even have been in the competition with the squad that won it in 2004. There was his Internazionale, Rafael Benitez’s Liverpool, Diego Simeone’s Atletico Madrid to select three, or Sir Alex Ferguson’s Manchester United, who continued to drive on in the competition, even when Ferguson’s squad was not as good. Now we see English squads packed with world-class players but no evidence that they are interested enough in getting the tactics right. Five or six of that Manchester City team which lost 2-1 at home to Barcelona would get into most teams in world


There was nothing wrong with City’s 4-4-2 formation but there was something seriously wrong about the way it was set up, with neither of the two strikers nor the wide players dropping in to deny Barcelona space in midfield. A catastrophic oversight.

Arsenal, as usual, went flying forward and left themselves vulnerable to the quick counter-attack, with no defensive leader to prevent that happening. Liverpool, who have been looking unbeatable in the Premier League, lost the midfield battle to Besiktas in Istanbul. They could have bypassed that problem by putting Rickie Lambert at the top with Raheem Sterling and Daniel Sturridge going around the back. They didn’t – and paid the price.

The continental European managers are beating the English-based ones hands down for tactics. It can be a chess match but if the strategy is right it’s not such a difficult one.

Everyone seems to get starry-eyed about foreign sides and their foreign managers. But what happened when Paris Saint-Germain played Barcelona last autumn? Laurent Blanc looked at the Barça centre-halves, realised there was a weakness there, went for physicality against them and won the game. You have to find something that you are better at than the opposition.

And what did City do? Decided to play Barcelona at their own game. We’ve seen where that got them. Because of what happened at the Etihad, the whole world seems to think that 4-4-2 is a disaster.

Well, I’m sorry, but that’s rubbish.

Shakhtar Donetsk managed a very creditable 0-0 draw with Bayern Munich last week – by using a flexible 4-4-2. Simeone’s Atletico use it all the time. The difference between Pellegrini and Simeone is that the Argentine employs it wisely.

Look anywhere across Europe – and working on the continental leagues I get my share of their football – and you see managers getting more than they should out of players because they “do” tactics.

The Portuguese club Boavista ought to have been overwhelmed in the Primeira Liga after getting their demotion overturned and being promoted two divisions at a stroke. They have 25 new players, most of them with very little top-flight experience. But they’re holding their own because their young manager Armando Goncalves Teixeira has had a long look at the opposition and decided what makes his own side strong.

In the great Champions League performances of modern times – Simeone’s Atletico beating Mourinho’s Chelsea in last season’s semi-final second leg, Mourinho’s 10-man Inter beating Barça in the 2010 Champions League semi-final and of course Benitez’s tactical adjustments in Istanbul a decade ago – it’s the same picture.

It’s hard to name a single manager of an English club who could really point to the strength of his squad as an excuse for European failure in the past few years. Roberto di Matteo at Chelsea, perhaps. That would be the only one.

The fact that City have already discovered the benefits of occasionally getting the tactics right makes these excuses about the Premier League decline even more difficult to listen to. Their best performance of the season in Europe was at Roma where they were without Sergio Aguero, Yaya Touré and Vincent Kompany but adapted to the situation in front of them. If you tell me that the City squad which struggled against CSKA Moscow was not substantially better than them, I’ll tell you that’s rubbish.

It’s no coincidence that Chelsea – the one English Champions League side with a tactically shrewd manager – look likely to be the only one left in a few weeks’ time.

Arsène Wenger is struggling. Manuel Pellegrini doesn’t seem to have the answers. Mourinho aside, I don’t see a manager in the Ferguson mould out there at the moment. That’s why it’s been such a terrible week in Europe.

 

[waspish]

The highlighted bit where he says our players didn't drop into defensive positions is the problem because I think our players are in 2 minds whether to close down up field which supposed to be our tactics

 

[cibaman]

There's a world of difference between 4-4-2 with Navas and Milner as the wide players, as at Roma, and 4-4-2 with Silva and Nasri as the wide players. They're opposite ends of the spectrum. One very solid defensively but limited offensively. The other extremely creative but non existent defensively.

Its not that 4-4-2 "Doesnt work", its that we sometimes dont get the balance right.

 

[hgblue]

There's a world of difference between 4-4-2 with Navas and Milner as the wide players, as at Roma, and 4-4-2 with Silva and Nasri as the wide players. They're opposite ends of the spectrum. One very solid defensively but limited offensively. The other extremely creative but non existent defensively.

Its not that 4-4-2 "Doesnt work", its that we sometimes dont get the balance right.

Also key to this system working against the likes of Barca is who partners Aguero. An attacking midfielder like Nasri or Silva, or an out and out striker like Dzeko. An identical formation can be radically different in it's effectiveness, due to this seemingly small adjustment.

-------------------------Hart------------------------

Zabaleta-----Kompany------Mangala-----Kolarov

Milner-------Yaya---------Fernandinho----Nasri

---------------------Silva---------------------

-------------------Aguero--------------------

I'm convinced this is the team that would give Barca the biggest headache, and we can bring the likes of Dzeko/Bony on if we're searching for a goal with half an hour left.

 

[Newman Noggs]

"A manager in the Ferguson mould" ?? More rag propaganda. Ferguson won it twice but was in it how many times ? In fact, didn't Mourinho totally out manoeuvre him on at least one memorable occasion ? If Pelligrini has as many goes at it as Ferguson and only wins it twice, then I would say he's failed in Europe.

 

[OB1]

"A manager in the Ferguson mould" ?? More rag propaganda. Ferguson won it twice but was in it how many times ? In fact, didn't Mourinho totally out manoeuvre him on at least one memorable occasion ? If Pelligrini has as many goes at it as Ferguson and only wins it twice, then I would say he's failed in Europe.

Good point.

I am a Pellegrini fan and one of those least critical of him but I do not view him as a tactical coach in the way that Mourinho is. I do think Pellegrini's tactical acumen is often underestimated though. However, I think Pellegrini is more driven by philosophy than tactics. He does not seem to go in for the tactical tinkering that some get lauded for but there could be plenty of tactical subtleties to what he does that by pass laymen such as me.

His basic philosophy is having a way he wants his team to play and devoting 80% of time on working at that rather than worrying about the specifics of the next opponent. As we have seen time and again, if the players do what he asks of them, they usually win. The big issues for me are:
(i) that I don't think enough of the players can deliver just what he wants consistently and that can only be rectified by changes in the squad;
(ii) too often players underperform and that may or may not be down to a failure on the part of the manager.

I now see tomorrow at Anfield as Pellegrini's biggest test yet in the job. You should not pin a manager's career all on one game but failure to win that could be the beginning of the end for him. I hope his players do not let him (or us) down. The odd's are always against us at Anfield and Liverpool have been resurgent lately in the league so Pellegrini could normally be forgiven for not chalking up a win there but not only are the three points absolutely vital if we are to retain a genuine chance of hanging onto our title, he needs to prove that he can get the tactics and team selection spot on; especially after failing to do so against Barca. This pair of games were always going to be major tests of his ability to learn from previous encounters.

 

[BobKowalski]

The highlighted bit where he says our players didn't drop into defensive positions is the problem because I think our players are in 2 minds whether to close down up field which supposed to be our tactics

And any indecision will kill any team at this level. I partly agree on the formation choice being the lesser issue. Irrespective of how you line up the preparation has to be spot on both physically and mentally before a game in the knock out stage of the CL. Anyone who is not sure of his role or is uncomfortable in his designated role both with and without the ball is just asking for trouble and trouble is what we got in that first half. That is down to the coaching staff. Its their job to set the right team up and prepare it accordingly.

The second half performance is both encouraging and dispiriting. Encouraging in that it shows we can mix it at the required level but dispiriting in that it takes us to be 2 goals down before we tried. Some have mentioned that it was down to Barca relaxing but worryingly for us its back to that 'we can play well when we have nothing to lose' default, ie beating Bayern when they have little riding on it. Against Barca at the start of the game we have everything to lose and it shows in hesitant and uncertain play. At 2-0 we have almost nothing to lose so fuck it we go for it and there is a marked difference in performance. This for me has always been our CL fault line and only once in the away game at Roma, where both teams had everything to lose and gain, have we crossed it.