Match Thread | Man City vs. Sparta Prague (23/10/24)

[Mr Ed (The Stables)]

Great goal from Phil, but we are passing the ball with no intensity, and not quickly enough imo.

Also how many times have we given the ball away on the edge of their box.

However Saviniho looks great and has caused them problems and won free kicks, we just need a decent final ball from him.

But the reality is once again we are playing a team with 10 outfield players behind the ball, and its hard work.

Hopefully they will have to come out more in the second half and that will give us a lot more space in behind them.

I'm still confident we'll win this quite comfortably, but we need the 2nd goal early in the 2nd half. Come on City!!

 

[wattle]

Maybe he could ask the other players to play a through ball to him? Just an idea.

He just doesn’t make the runs anymore because he’s Fred up with not being played in. It’s a cheat mode that we just hardly ever use

 

[madloaf]

flappers will flap

Yeah, I don't think this a flappers thing. I think some people, myself included are bored/frustrated by the style of play. I guess we're just spoilt bastards or some such silly insult.

 

[paulchapo]

never a penalty

Well it wasn't given so that's that.

 

[deano ou812]

its boring but its due to the parked bus we now face on repeat match after match. it hard to break up these deep tactics, all our defenders on 35 metres from the opposite goal, hardly any space to attack, and even in 1-0 City lead some teams happy to sit back.

it leaves us with long shots and crossing but most of our crosses are poor and even if they are good they need to find about 1-3 City players between 6-7 defenders. quite hard.

doesnt mean we cannot up our tempo as again imo Bernardo and Gundo are quite poor and dont add much.

unfortunately most of our games will be about breaking up these type of defences with very limited space and occassional risk of being wide open due to being pushed up even our defenders closer to opp. box than halfway line.

wish Arse, dippers would face as uch similar tactics but they dont (yet).

I’d say Sparta wouldn’t even play like this against Madrid or Barca ..

 

[Tricky_Trev]

We need to know whether Nunes has what it takes to play in the middle, considering the lack of legs in there and he is our quickest midfielder. Even if it means Foden going onto the wing (or Bernardo), I think we need to use a significant chunk of this game to see him in the centre. I think using Nunes on the left tonight is a bit pointless, we need him to answer questions in the middle - that’s where we might need him.

 

[Stoned Rose]

Fuck Nunes off and give Mcatee some minutes.

 

[madloaf]

He just doesn’t make the runs anymore because he’s Fred up with not being played in. It’s a cheat mode that we just hardly ever use

Exactly. He doesn't make runs because he knows the balls not coming....one follows the other.

 

[SamBlue]

How do we go long when there’s no space?

Exactly, when Phil had a shot just before HT, all 11 Sparta's player's were in the box. Crosses, cut-backs and fast passing are almost impossible to achieve something.
Only a quick movement and shooting from outside. The former quite difficult with this tactics and Erling up top.
Pep probably angry remembering Bielsa's words how he created his worst enemy with his tactics and success. Even Arsenal and RM played like this against us.

 

[mancity2012_eamo]

Surely the best manager that’s ever lived can come up with something different against these tactics for Haaland. The very odd occasions he comes deep to join in play the whole pitch opens up. It happened near the end, it opened up, and Lewis just stopped and went back to the bleeding centre backs again. I never thought I’d ever be bored watching City, but this session is a hard watch. It’s obviously not all city’s fault, but watching the best scorer in the world doing nothing is maddening

He never makes a near post run. It’s always behind the defender or defenders.
Even when we get by the last man it’s difficult for our wingers to find a target.