Newcastle 1-1 City post match thread

[Hart of the Matter]

Needed Nasari, Kompany and Yaya should not have started and Bony/Sterling were not the answer.

 

[sh249]

I think the only other option for the starting 11 was to start with Fernandinho. Apart from that he didn't have too many options given the injury list again. Blame the players.......

I don't think there was anything wrong with the initial selection, given the options available.
The plan was obviously to rest Fernandinho - understandably, given that he's run himself into the ground over the past few weeks (or rather the whole season). It may also have been on express advice from the medical staff, for all we know. I suspect that had he started Fernandinho, there would have been a far few ready to criticise him for doing so.
It also made sense to start Kompany, as he obviously needs games if he's to be even considered for Madrid. And it would have been daft to start Sterling and Kompany when they're both just coming back from injury.
So the starting eleven pretty much picked itself. We could have set up differently - i.e. with Fernando and Delph in the middle behind Toure, with De Bruyne out wide. But I can see why we didn't - not only would it have meant shunting De Bruyne out of his best position, but Toure is invariably crap when he starts in a more advanced position, and a midfield of Fernando and Delph is incredibly limited. I can't really see how that would have helped solve our biggest problem tonight - namely, the inability to pass the fucking ball to teammates. Otherwise, it could possibly have been a more orthodox 4-3-3 (like against Sevilla) - but that too would have meant sticking De Bruyne out wide.
I also don't really see the huge problem with starting Delph from the left. Not much different to playing Fernandinho from the right. Obviously not a natural there, but then it's not like he struggled tonight from lacking the orthodox left winger's ability to beat a man - if that was the case, then fair fucks, you could say it was an inevitably of playing out of position. His main problem was that he couldn't control the ball or pass it in the right direction - which isn't something that can be simply put down to playing in a wider position. It was just a staggeringly inept performance.
For me, the major issue tonight, as so often this season, was the attitude of the players, who were happy to go through the motions. And that isn't an apologia for Pellegrini - he's responsible for instilling the right attitude in the players, which is something he has proven incapable of doing far too often. He should also have changed things much more quickly, as well.
And I didn't watch the post-match interviews, but if he suggested that he was happy with the performance, then he's a fucking idiot.

 

[blue jay 16]

Shit

 

[gregblag]

Any time Navas gets the ball in an advanced position I don't even get excited now as I know it will come to nothing. I'm almost sure that Aguero won't even give him the ball any more cos he thinks the same

There was Nasri's pass to Aguaro that he scored from against Chelsea. Navas was completely clear and the logical player to pass to. I was just so happy that he never got the ball because there was no chance we would have scored.

 

[Millwallawayveteran1988]

I don't think there was anything wrong with the initial selection, given the options available.
The plan was obviously to rest Fernandinho - understandably, given that he's run himself into the ground over the past few weeks (or rather the whole season). It may also have been on express advice from the medical staff, for all we know. I suspect that had he started Fernandinho, there would have been a far few ready to criticise him for doing so.
It also made sense to start Kompany, as he obviously needs games if he's to be even considered for Madrid. And it would have been daft to start Sterling and Kompany when they're both just coming back from injury.
So the starting eleven pretty much picked itself. We could have set up differently - i.e. with Fernando and Delph in the middle behind Toure, with De Bruyne out wide. But I can see why we didn't - not only would it have meant shunting De Bruyne out of his best position, but Toure is invariably crap when he starts in a more advanced position, and a midfield of Fernando and Delph is incredibly limited. I can't really see how that would have helped solve our biggest problem tonight - namely, the inability to pass the fucking ball to teammates. Otherwise, it could possibly have been a more orthodox 4-3-3 (like against Sevilla) - but that too would have meant sticking De Bruyne out wide.
I also don't really see the huge problem with starting Delph from the left. Not much different to playing Fernandinho from the right. Obviously not a natural there, but then it's not like he struggled tonight from lacking the orthodox left winger's ability to beat a man - if that was the case, then fair fucks, you could say it was an inevitably of playing out of position. His main problem was that he couldn't control the ball or pass it in the right direction - which isn't something that can be simply put down to playing in a wider position. It was just a staggeringly inept performance.
For me, the major issue tonight, as so often this season, was the attitude of the players, who were happy to go through the motions. And that isn't an apologia for Pellegrini - he's responsible for instilling the right attitude in the players, which is something he has proven incapable of doing far too often. He should also have changed things much more quickly, as well.
And I didn't watch the post-match interviews, but if he suggested that he was happy with the performance, then he's a fucking idiot.

If he wanted to rest Fernandinho with Madrid in mind then for me it should have been done against Stoke. Toure is always better at home and never plays well two games in a row in 3 days. I can only think that Toure won't be playing Safurday and will be playing Tuesday based on this

 

[stevemcgarry]

I'm not going to complain about team selection because I thought in depth about it the pre-match and had almost (maybe exactly) the same X!.

What I don't understand is why Yaya plays behind and even with Delph.

Delph isn't the type of player who id going to create a lot of chances going forward, but he is the type to win the ball and play neat tidy passes. He should have played in the Fernandinho role, with Yaya playing basically as a 10. Fernando shielding the back line. Instead, Yaya was sitting back, not playing "yaya defense" and Delph was playing as a left attacking middy.

That's the problem. Yaya is great going forward but wank when it comes to defensive duties. If you play Yaya as a 10 then you have to shunt KDB out on to a wing and that's a waste. So Manuel sacrifices his absolute best defensive shield of the two Ferns (or a Fern and a Delph) to shoehorn Yaya into the team ... and it's killing us. Because then, instead of having two players harrying, chasing, intercepting, you have one bloke trying to do the work of two men while Yaya jogs about in the middle. That makes the one guy look poor and exposes the back line - which, for me, is why our defense has looked so bad at times this year. Play the two Ferns and Manga and Ota look great.

 

[FanchesterCity]

Newcastle looked useless and still appeared to be the better team.
Sick to death of seeing performances like this, they happen far too often. Watching it on TV you see closeups of players faces and they there are far too many with sighing, feeling hard done to, or disinterested.
Newcastle were there for the taking, it wasn't like they were revved up and scrapping for everything - they couldn't believe their luck at how bad we were!

You might be forgiven for thinking it's a CL semi-final coming up and they were going easy on themselves, but it's a style (loose use of the word) of football we've seen before.

When we think we've turned a corner, instead of pressing on and emphasising our strengths, we start taking things easy and expose our biggest weaknesses - complacency and lack of workrate.

I wish I could blame tactics / team selection, and there are plenty of arguments for wondering why certain players keep getting games, but it still doesn't justify the real elephant in the room - attitude.
Yes, I know we've shown fight at times - which demonstrates we are capable of it, but for every time we've shown fight, there is at least another game when we've shown none at all. Tonight was one of those nights.

No urgency, no sense of importance with regard to our top 4 status, no determination.

Has Navas really taken us any further forward from the Johnson days?
Have we got a better central defence than the Lescott days?
Have we got battling midfield that's any stronger than the De Jong days?

We've been damn lucky to get De Bruyne who is clearly an improved addition to our squad, but other than him, are we REALLY much further forward than 3 years ago? I don't believe we are.
I'm not convinced out CL semi-final status is truly an indication of genuine progression - more likely we managed to do quite well for once, but hardly a confirmation of being one of the best 4 in Europe.

We have a very soft underbelly and it has to change.

 

[cleavers]

Hart - Good
Zabaleta - Average
Kompany -Poor
Mangala - Average
Kolarov - Poor
Fernando - Average
Delph - Poor
Navas - Poor
Toure - Poor
De Bruyne - Good
Aguero - Average

I thought De Bruyne and Aguero were poor, I'd agree with the rest, and while average, Zab looks like his legs have gone, much as it pains me to say that.

 

[Marvin]

I don't think there was anything wrong with the initial selection, given the options available.
The plan was obviously to rest Fernandinho - understandably, given that he's run himself into the ground over the past few weeks (or rather the whole season). It may also have been on express advice from the medical staff, for all we know. I suspect that had he started Fernandinho, there would have been a far few ready to criticise him for doing so.
It also made sense to start Kompany, as he obviously needs games if he's to be even considered for Madrid. And it would have been daft to start Sterling and Kompany when they're both just coming back from injury.
So the starting eleven pretty much picked itself. We could have set up differently - i.e. with Fernando and Delph in the middle behind Toure, with De Bruyne out wide. But I can see why we didn't - not only would it have meant shunting De Bruyne out of his best position, but Toure is invariably crap when he starts in a more advanced position, and a midfield of Fernando and Delph is incredibly limited. I can't really see how that would have helped solve our biggest problem tonight - namely, the inability to pass the fucking ball to teammates. Otherwise, it could possibly have been a more orthodox 4-3-3 (like against Sevilla) - but that too would have meant sticking De Bruyne out wide.
I also don't really see the huge problem with starting Delph from the left. Not much different to playing Fernandinho from the right. Obviously not a natural there, but then it's not like he struggled tonight from lacking the orthodox left winger's ability to beat a man - if that was the case, then fair fucks, you could say it was an inevitably of playing out of position. His main problem was that he couldn't control the ball or pass it in the right direction - which isn't something that can be simply put down to playing in a wider position. It was just a staggeringly inept performance.
For me, the major issue tonight, as so often this season, was the attitude of the players, who were happy to go through the motions. And that isn't an apologia for Pellegrini - he's responsible for instilling the right attitude in the players, which is something he has proven incapable of doing far too often. He should also have changed things much more quickly, as well.
And I didn't watch the post-match interviews, but if he suggested that he was happy with the performance, then he's a fucking idiot.

You can't play Toure in high tempo games. He just can't handle that. Unfortunately with all the games coming up and Nasri and Silva out, Fernandinho can;t play every game. I'd have done it the other way around, played Toure at home to Stoke and Fernandinho tonight and rested Fernandinho against Stoke so he can play vs Real Madrid

 

[FlatlineMonday]

I also don't really see the huge problem with starting Delph from the left. Not much different to playing Fernandinho from the right. Obviously not a natural there, but then it's not like he struggled tonight from lacking the orthodox left winger's ability to beat a man - if that was the case, then fair fucks, you could say it was an inevitably of playing out of position. His main problem was that he couldn't control the ball or pass it in the right direction - which isn't something that can be simply put down to playing in a wider position. It was just a staggeringly inept performance.

I don't understand why he had to be played at all on the left, however. Why not play him in the midfield alongside Fernando, move Toure forward, and have De Bruyne play on the left?