I suspect Pep's arrival will come as an uncomfortable shock to some people at the club, and there will be tears before bedtime. I expect radical change, and some players (not necessarily ones that get slagged off on here every week) wanting to leave.
But ultimately, it will be for the best.
Interesting theories! In retrospect it does seem we need some time to adjust the mindset. A few years ago in Champions League we seemed rather nervous when facing Napoli, not to mention the biggest teams. And then it's been two years group stage and two years round-of-16. This year is quite a huge jump to the semi-finals, and playing in Santiago Bernabeu might be quite a pressure for some of our players, especially those who haven't played there yet. Coupled with some gap of quality we have in the team against Real, I'm not that aghast about the performance. Next year should be better because we've already got experience as a semi-finalist.
Good point Brian, I think most of these players were complaining about Mancini not treating them like adults and then Pellegrini comes in and is the complete opposite, they're unable to manage themselves. Pep does seem like a middle ground, he'll give them guidelines that they need to stick to but other than that they are free, but i'd imagine if they put a foot wrong they'll be fucked.I seem to recall that when I studied management many moons ago, there was a style of management called 'country club' where the employees enjoyed themselves, but very little was achieved. I can't help but think City have gone 'country club'.
I suspect Pep's arrival will come as an uncomfortable shock to some people at the club, and there will be tears before bedtime. I expect radical change, and some players (not necessarily ones that get slagged off on here every week) wanting to leave.
But ultimately, it will be for the best.
I'm the harshest person on our teams performances, but was oddly calm on Wed night.
Why?
Because looking at the evidence this season, this current team was not capable of performing any better than they did against Real Madrid. I don't believe for a minute we could have done any better. Real perhaps could have done worse, had a red card or a penalty etc to shift the odds in our favour, but that's their performance and not ours.
Could we have fluked it? Perhaps.
Could we have won it? Perhaps.
But if we played Real Madrid over 2 legs 10 times, the outcome would be the same overall.
To me that's not a mentality thing, it's a squad talent thing. I've played and coached sports at a decent level and there's no way any player in our squad didn't give 100% of what they could in that environment on Wed. Yaya did. Kolarov would have. Kun did. But some of these would have known deep inside that they were in too deep, didn't have the engine anymore to compete on that stage, or didn't have enough players of a high enough skill level to match Real man for man. So in a way some of our boys(I'll use Yaya as an example here) were beat before the ball was kicked off. Is this a mentality thing or is it a player having a realistic expectation of the outcome based on their maximum level of performance? I think it's the latter.
Now, where we do have a major, major mentality issue is the management. And yes, I'm going to slate Pellers again, but the same held true for Mancini(who I adored), Hughes and Sven.
All allowed complacency into our squad. They all at some stage have given a squad an excuse to underperform.
"It's only Stoke and there's a champions league game in 3 days time".
"It's only a cup game and the league game is the priority".
"Injuries are hurting our season".
I remember one game a few years back against Everton where it was pouring rain and Mancini was moaning before the game, saying it was impossible to play in these conditions.
He trotted out in a stupid large jacket, big wooly hat, scarf, gloves etc and everything about him screamed he didn't want to be there. How does he expect to get a performance from players when this is what they see from their leaders?(needless to say we lost)
None of our managers to date have had a consistent winners mentality.
Pep will change that and it will permeate down to the kids on the cusp of breaking into the team.
I'm not sure I agree completely with that mate. If you take it player by player, all of the guys who started have played in huge games and probably in the Bernabeu (although given not in a semi of champs league) before. They went out on Wednesday with a fear and what seemed like an acceptance that we have done well to reach the semi's, actually going as far as admitting it in interviews. Success is winning, not almost winning.
Good point Brian, I think most of these players were complaining about Mancini not treating them like adults and then Pellegrini comes in and is the complete opposite, they're unable to manage themselves. Pep does seem like a middle ground, he'll give them guidelines that they need to stick to but other than that they are free, but i'd imagine if they put a foot wrong they'll be fucked.