Manuel Pellegrini (cont)

[paulsimpson]

Put simply we must go and beat stoke midweek, anything less and I think he'll be gone sooner than most on here think. The gap between ourselves and the chavs is growing as quickly as the chasing pack are closing us down. He needs to drum it into the players over the next few days that nothing less than victory will do. now you can go on about our poor record against them and how difficult it is to go there and win, put simply he has a fantastic squad of world class players with the odd donkey thrown in. He needs to send them out revved up and play a high intensity game from the offset. The rest will take care of itself. No passengers for this one for the moment of truth has well and truly arrived.

I would agree with you . Lose or even draw to stoke and the pressure will be gigantic for MP . Management are in a tough situation of their own making IMO .

 

[Ray78]

Put simply we must go and beat stoke midweek, anything less and I think he'll be gone sooner than most on here think. The gap between ourselves and the chavs is growing as quickly as the chasing pack are closing us down. He needs to drum it into the players over the next few days that nothing less than victory will do. now you can go on about our poor record against them and how difficult it is to go there and win, put simply he has a fantastic squad of world class players with the odd donkey thrown in. He needs to send them out revved up and play a high intensity game from the offset. The rest will take care of itself. No passengers for this one for the moment of truth has well and truly arrived.

We will give him the rest of this season because simply there are no other realistic candidates available. As for whether he will see out the remainder of his contract is down to how we perform against Barcelona and how we will end the campaign. Admittedly I am concerned on how that will end up as our current form is poor and we don't look like a side who can trouble any side.

Even if we were to drop out of the top 4 you think he'd still get to the end of the season Ray - I'm not so sure. If that were to happen I think the club may look for an alternative, from either inside or outside the club, even if only short term.

We might be looking for alternatives to our main candidates but the only way he leaves earlier if it is mathematically impossible for us to qualify for a Champions League spot. We will give him as long as possible imo.

 

[mancity1]

Put simply we must go and beat stoke midweek, anything less and I think he'll be gone sooner than most on here think. The gap between ourselves and the chavs is growing as quickly as the chasing pack are closing us down. He needs to drum it into the players over the next few days that nothing less than victory will do. now you can go on about our poor record against them and how difficult it is to go there and win, put simply he has a fantastic squad of world class players with the odd donkey thrown in. He needs to send them out revved up and play a high intensity game from the offset. The rest will take care of itself. No passengers for this one for the moment of truth has well and truly arrived.

I would agree with you . Lose or even draw to stoke and the pressure will be gigantic for MP . Management are in a tough situation of their own making IMO .

Lets face it the title is over the Cup exits were pathetic and he is gone no matter what occurs.

I agree that its important we hang onto a Chumps League place but if we don't it will be the wake up call the club needs that you cannot bask on past success and think it will happen just because you have " the squad ".

You have to work even harder and smarter each and every year and if you don't you are cactus and so it will be for MP.

The truth is and many have said it we haven't recruited well under the current regime and if it goes tits up this year which is a real possibility given our last 6 performances on the spin which have been shocking to say the least then they should be moved on as well.

 

[BobKowalski]

Simply put our form over the last month or so will not make us champions. In fact our form this season has been patchy at best. Throw in two dismal cup exits and quite possibly the worst (albeit funniest) CL performance at home to CSKA Moscow and it does not bode well.

The issue has been touched on twice by Pellers. A 'lack of trust' and 'nervousness' were the words he used. The players lack confidence in themselves and/or distrust what they are being asked to do which is breeding slow hesitant play. This is still an immensely talented squad and immensely talented players can influence a football match but if they don't have belief in what they are doing, themselves or the way they are being asked to play they will not produce enough quality performances on a consistent basis to win titles (or it seems cups).

Pellers has to instill that belief.

That aside our comedy defending would undermine anyone's confidence. I remember reading that one complaint was the tedium of training sessions on team shape and defensive drills with and without the ball. Well that 'tedium' did produce a significant benefit and that is we didn't concede a fucking goal every single fucking PL match. You could see that defensive discipline being eroded last season and right now it is practically non existent.

I really do not see the benefit of a porous set up that encourages you to leak goals. It looks even worse if you are not exactly banging them in at the other end either. Are we meant to consider this 'attractive football'? If by attractive they mean its bleeding hilarious to see grown men colliding with each other and falling on their collective arses then OK I see where you are coming from. Hell just add buckets of water and foam pies and stop calling it a football match and you'll have a winner on your hands.

It bugged me last season and it bugs me this one too. The balance between attack and defence. fluidity and discipline is off and right now it so far off its produced our worst sequence of result since well Mark Hughes I guess. I said after Chelsea I was more optimistic about winning the title provided we carried the same level of performance into the rest of the season. Today, and for too many days this season, we didn't match that level of performance and unless we dramatically improve our performance level it doesn't matter if we are 2, 5 or 7 points adrift because right now this team is winning jack shit.

It seems incredible that they don't have belief, confidence or 'trust' in what they are doing, doesn't it, considering those players started the season as champions - very strange.

Do you mean one complaint about Mancini? Many of the personnel are the same, and there have been plenty of defence-minded signings brought in since Mancini, and it cant seriously be the case that plenty of defensive work isnt done on the training pitch. That being said, I'd agree all of the back 5, possibly with the exception of Clichy, have taken a dip in form this season, so something is certainly in need of improvement

Yes it is odd and I thought Pellers observations were very telling.

And yes I did mean one complaint about Mancini. I think even Chappers bought it up when he was airing his grievances. To be honest I was trying to avoid mentioning 'he who must not be named' as people start having the screaming abdabs. Clearly we do not know the amount of defensive work being done on the training pitch or type of work done but you can draw conclusions given that we are conceding more season by season and also just by looking at the team on the pitch. One conclusion is that we do little to no defensive work (unlikely), the other is that what ever work we do its not very effective. Its like corners were we seem to have totally given up.

The other odd thing is that when Mangala first joined up Pellers held him back so that he 'could learn the way we defend'. He then played him against Chelsea and it was like hallelujah. We defended well. Mangala played well. Happy days. Then it goes to shit again and has been largely shit all season. Frankly its a bleeding mystery.

 

[BillyShears]

This thread and today on the whole has an eery resemblance to Sunderland at home last season. It was shite, poor, not good enough, etc. Pellegrini made so many mistakes today I don't know where to begin. But shit happens. We didn't lose which is a blessing for no other reason than I said a week ago we wouldn't lose another match this season :(

It keeps coming round but I think this squad has had it's 'cycle' and i'd be happy to rip up large parts of it and start again with a new generation of players, even if it means being less 'dominant' for the next two or three years. Maybe we need to take one step back to take two forward.

 

[Gaylord du Bois]

This thread and today on the whole has an eery resemblance to Sunderland at home last season. It was shite, poor, not good enough, etc. Pellegrini made so many mistakes today I don't know where to begin. But shit happens. We didn't lose which is a blessing for no other reason than I said a week ago we wouldn't lose another match this season :(

It keeps coming round but I think this squad has had it's 'cycle' and i'd be happy to rip up large parts of it and start again with a new generation of players, even if it means being less 'dominant' for the next two or three years. Maybe we need to take one step back to take two forward.

You're drunk, go to bed.

 

[pudge]

This thread and today on the whole has an eery resemblance to Sunderland at home last season. It was shite, poor, not good enough, etc. Pellegrini made so many mistakes today I don't know where to begin. But shit happens. We didn't lose which is a blessing for no other reason than I said a week ago we wouldn't lose another match this season :(

It keeps coming round but I think this squad has had it's 'cycle' and i'd be happy to rip up large parts of it and start again with a new generation of players, even if it means being less 'dominant' for the next two or three years. Maybe we need to take one step back to take two forward.

Or Stoke at home this season

Or Burnley at home this season

Or Arsenal at home this season

Or Newcastle at home this season

Or Middlesbrough at home this season

etc

Take your pick.

 

[BillyShears]

This thread and today on the whole has an eery resemblance to Sunderland at home last season. It was shite, poor, not good enough, etc. Pellegrini made so many mistakes today I don't know where to begin. But shit happens. We didn't lose which is a blessing for no other reason than I said a week ago we wouldn't lose another match this season :(

It keeps coming round but I think this squad has had it's 'cycle' and i'd be happy to rip up large parts of it and start again with a new generation of players, even if it means being less 'dominant' for the next two or three years. Maybe we need to take one step back to take two forward.

Or Stoke at home this season

Or Burnley at home this season

Or Arsenal at home this season

Or Newcastle at home this season

Or Middlesbrough at home this season

etc

Take your pick.

You really think all those games followed the same pattern? You clearly didn't watch them.

If you're referring specifically to my comment about the comparisons to Sunderland at home last season, it's more to do with the reactions on here rather than the performance. Some people seemingly live with a white flag in their pocket which they're ready to raise at the first sign of trouble.

 

[flb]

This thread and today on the whole has an eery resemblance to Sunderland at home last season. It was shite, poor, not good enough, etc. Pellegrini made so many mistakes today I don't know where to begin. But shit happens. We didn't lose which is a blessing for no other reason than I said a week ago we wouldn't lose another match this season :(

It keeps coming round but I think this squad has had it's 'cycle' and i'd be happy to rip up large parts of it and start again with a new generation of players, even if it means being less 'dominant' for the next two or three years. Maybe we need to take one step back to take two forward.

And you would seriously let Pellegrini loose with £100 million in his pocket? That's brave fella.

 

[BobKowalski]

This thread and today on the whole has an eery resemblance to Sunderland at home last season. It was shite, poor, not good enough, etc. Pellegrini made so many mistakes today I don't know where to begin. But shit happens. We didn't lose which is a blessing for no other reason than I said a week ago we wouldn't lose another match this season :(

It keeps coming round but I think this squad has had it's 'cycle' and i'd be happy to rip up large parts of it and start again with a new generation of players, even if it means being less 'dominant' for the next two or three years. Maybe we need to take one step back to take two forward.

I am not sure ripping up large parts of the squad is necessary, desirable or even practical. It is still an excellent squad and players like Silva, Aguero, Kompany, Nasri, Hart have all signed new contracts with presumably every intention of keeping them for a few years yet. Milner is also wanted with Yaya being the possible exception due to age.

The issue is not the composition of the team or the squad but that it is playing well under its collective level. I think we have a better more rounded squad than Chelsea and are a better side on our day its just that our day is becoming increasingly scarce. Additionally you can evolve the team and squad over several transfer windows and still remain competitive. And by competitive I mean how about we beat Newcastle and Boro at home in the cups? How much ripping up do we need to accomplish that? That failure is more about attitude and a lack of leadership. Unless you change that attitude and lack of leadership you will just replicate our current failings with different players.