Our attack - what's off?

Relied too heavily on Sergio and Jesus for too long, lack of investment in a centre forward by Pep whilst wasting millions on players like Mahrez, Mendy, Cancelo is a joke
 
bugsyblue said:
My post might have been too narrowly focussed. It's not solely the attacking players that are the problem. Let me give you a specific example of what we are missing:



This is an attacking move from the back. One touch football, possessions based, quick distribution, fluid movement. If you mark this as 10/10 we're running at 5/10 or 6/10 at best!

We haven't seen us play like this against a top side in awhile. That has nothing to do with Aguero being injured or KDB not 100%. Sadly, it's something bigger than that.

A contrasting example was how Walker ran from his own half deep into Liverpool's backline before being tackled. I remember a lot of blues in the match day forum championed that - they saw someone driving at Liverpool's defence - yet what it showed me was the lack of movement and passing options he had.

Maybe this is down to fitness and I'm worrying unnecessarily but there's fundamentally something gone from our attacking play. I don't quite know what or why but we aren't at the level we were at two seasons ago. Maybe we set the bar so high it's unrealistic to expect us to hit that every season?
Click to expand...

You are definitely on the right lines. When I think of us at our best that is one of the goals I envisage. I haven’t counted properly but there must be 12 or so passes in that move. 50/50 split backwards and forwards. The noticeable thing though is the pace of the pass. We just don’t seem to be able to replicate that. Certainly what we are playing just now is miles from that pace.
 
We need players to run at the defence. our players are not taking enough risks, scared of loosing the ball.
 
bugsyblue said:
My post might have been too narrowly focussed. It's not solely the attacking players that are the problem. Let me give you a specific example of what we are missing:



This is an attacking move from the back. One touch football, possessions based, quick distribution, fluid movement. If you mark this as 10/10 we're running at 5/10 or 6/10 at best!

We haven't seen us play like this against a top side in awhile. That has nothing to do with Aguero being injured or KDB not 100%. Sadly, it's something bigger than that.

A contrasting example was how Walker ran from his own half deep into Liverpool's backline before being tackled. I remember a lot of blues in the match day forum championed that - they saw someone driving at Liverpool's defence - yet what it showed me was the lack of movement and passing options he had.

Maybe this is down to fitness and I'm worrying unnecessarily but there's fundamentally something gone from our attacking play. I don't quite know what or why but we aren't at the level we were at two seasons ago. Maybe we set the bar so high it's unrealistic to expect us to hit that every season?
Click to expand...


If you look at that goal yes City are knocking the ball around quickly but also arsenal are in our half trying to close us down.
Teams dont do that know they only close us down by the 18 yard box now. Spurs tonight I think didnt try to put our defence under pressure just all 11 retreated back to just in front of their box. Teams are defending even deeper against us now
 
give it to gordon said:
If you look at that goal yes City are knocking the ball around quickly but also arsenal are in our half trying to close us down.
Teams dont do that know they only close us down by the 18 yard box now. Spurs tonight I think didnt try to put our defence under pressure just all 11 retreated back to just in front of their box. Teams are defending even deeper against us now
Click to expand...
Which is why we needed to adapt our tactics, maybe hit some longer balls, crosses in to the box although a 3rd striker with a bit of height would have been a good option. Other teams have adapted, we haven’t
 
Is it as simple as just teasing the other team out?

if we simply set out whole team deeper then surely the other team has no option but to come out to get the ball?
 
that goal against Arsenal and one against Stoke are among my favorite goals of the Pep era. But as a previous poster mentioned, teams don’t play like that any longer unfortunately and both Arsenal and Stoke were in a demise back then, no matter how good the goals were. Teams have played catch-up with us since and at the moment, Chelsea, Liverpool, Tottenham and dare I say Leicester are much more a threat going forward than we are. Score a goal against us and you have at least a point atm. We didn’t even manage to score more than 1 against Leeds with their leaky defense. It’s time for Pep to change tactics in the league now, it can’t get much worse than this.
 
We faced massed defences in 11/12 . We toyed with them for a while and if they stayed too deep we let Yaya run right over them. Plus when we crossed into the box we had Edin to challenge . We had so many options now we're a one trick poney. This Team wouldn't stand a chance against 11/12 team.
 
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