Our owners - next move?

[Marvin]

We have won the league twice in 3 seasons...hardly underperforming

There are some right fannies on here

So we have not got it right in the CL yet...it will come

The way some of you wet wipes are deconstructing our players you would think we had 11 Gerry Creaney's in our squad

Three words

Get A Grip

We're at a point where we need to succeed in Europe, or perform at a decent level, and the players aren't trying. That indicates trouble

 

[BobKowalski]

Whatever our owners next move is I trust it will be not to panic. Thats our job.

Actually we know what the next move will be. Grow the business on and off the pitch. You just have to look at what it was 5 years ago and where it is now and then project forward. It will not involve gutting the current squad. Chucking out half the squad is just fan talk.

Will repeat what I said in another thread:

This squad is good enough to compete in Europe. It has been good enough to compete in Europe for the past 4 years. Yes we have been hindered by FFP but PSG have been hit with the same FFP restrictions and they still compete. We are not talking about winning the CL we are talking about competing. We are talking about beating teams like CSKA Moscow which we can do right now and did so 12 months ago. We are not asking for much. Even our owners are not asking for the impossible. Just compete.

Compete. So why don't we compete? Last night we could have played whatever formation you liked and probably still lost. Its in their heads. For starters the players have so little faith in the way they prepare and set up for CL games we are pretty much beat before we get on the pitch. You can bring in a Di Maria or whoever right now and we would still be awful just as ManU were fairly awful on Sunday because for a lot of their players beating us is the impossible dream. Right now competing in the CL is the impossible dream. Nothing to do with pace, or formations. Right now its about confidence. Even Kompany has now got it into his head its about refs and conspiracies and once you start the match believing that well guess what? It will happen.

Confidence and belief allows you to think faster, move the ball faster, pass with better precision and so on. How many times did we play some aimless, pointless ball across field to god knows who? Clichy, Zabs, Fernando. Jovetic were bedevilled with so much indecision and hesitancy it was frightening.

Pellers said last night he had no idea why the team cannot play CL football. Unfortunately for Pellers having no idea isn't really an option. What Pellers has to do is instil the mentality necessary to do well in the CL. We have it in the PL because Mancini put it there. We have an excellent PL winning machine which took a season or two to build. Now Pellers has to do the same in the CL. If he doesn't then someone else will be employed to do so.

Bob, I've often argued the opposite of your theory that there's a mental problem within the squad with regards the CL, however I'm rapidly coming round to your way of thinking.

To a greater or lesser extent I think you're right that the squad is good enough to compete in Europe and we've been turned over by too many nothing sides under both Pellegrini and Mancini for it to be purely a managerial problem. That's not to say that they both haven't made mistakes but at the root of it, there's a deeper malaise at play.

For me the reason I believe the squad will be broken up next summer and why i think it's necessary is because collectively the problem has grown to such an extent that the only resolution left is to look at rebuilding. We've had different managers with different styles of management and the problem in Europe has remained the same.

Malaise is the word of the day for me. Its why I think buying in players may not be the answer. I think they too will be infected with the negative culture that exists at the club with respect to the CL. I can understand why we see the CL the way we do but first and foremost we have to eradicate this malaise, just as we had to eradicate the malaise or the culture of inferiority that existed at the club with regard to the PL. And the longer we struggle the deeper the malaise sets in.

I am not sure what the solution is to tell the truth. It may just turn on that one defining moment. Two storming wins against Bayern and Roma may just flip the switch and start the cleansing process. Perhaps last night we hit rock bottom and the only way now is up. Who knows. But I am convinced that we need to be smarter and more adaptable when it comes to the CL. That is a necessary starting point. Milners pre match interview for me set off all sorts of warning bells. Just as 'Mancini is crap in Europe' became a narrative to hide behind I think 'Pellers is too open and inflexible in Europe' is an alternative narrative for the players to hide behind. So lets stop being open. Start by being difficult to beat. Keep it compact. Hell just do something different in an attempt to break the pattern. It certainly cannot be worse than then this cycle of rinse and repeat and hope for the best approach.

 

[peter.evans]

Good post but the question of whether Pellegrini is the right man to rebuild the squad is the wrong one, given that it should be Txiki who is in charge of that anyway, the whole point being we're not tied to a certain set of players only working under a certain manager.

It's also another reason people shouldn't be so quick to criticise Pellegrini or Mancini, the latter as you rightly point out knew this team still needed huge investment to make proper inroads in Europe. Say what you like about what a nasty man he was, he bloody well knew his football. Pellegrini may be happier to get on with what he's been given, but also as you say, shouldn't be made the patsy for sub-par players incapable or unwilling to play like professional footballers.

That in mind,

1) I was under the impression given our new financial standing that this would no longer be an issue. We should be able to spend plenty to fix the squad without pissing everyone off, but ultimate if the choice is a world class football team or delaying UEFA coming up with a new arbitrary set of rules to punish us by, I'd suggest the former is the way to go.

2) Of course. The coaches you could say are a definitive cut above Pellegrini you can count on one hand - The man contrary to more recent belief is not an idiot. I'd love to see Pep here, just to see if the forum would still demand him out at the first sign of trouble, because rest assured no-one is going to come in and win everything all the time. There's a niggling worry that in Mancini and Pellegrini we've still never had a 'Tier 1' manager like Pep or Ancelotti, but even they will fall foul if they're given players who won't try. They're football managers, not miracle workers.

3) They have to decide who's opinion is more important, the establishment or the public. Because in trying to appease the establishment you can be damn sure we're the European laughing stock of the public. People were talking before our group how it was daft that the English champions were in with the German champions, and yet here we are on course to finish bottom of the group again, all because we tried to keep a few wannabe dictators happy by slipping over the draw bridge before it was raised. We should have been pushing for proper fairness from the start, not hoping they would let us into the gang and we could stick two fingers up to everyone else.

I feel much saner and much better reading posts like this.

Good to see in amongst the usual knee jerk crap there's a lot of well thought out and rational responses to what the future holds and requires.

On point 3, there's something which I think we cannot ignore. Look at what simply having Lampard play a few games did for our media coverage. The post Chelsea love in was unbelievable. It's my firm belief that to win hearts and minds, we need the next crop of ENGLISH talent in our squad. It's a reality which United and Chelsea have been aware of and very good at for a decade know. Understanding that that English core helps shape the narrative. We really need that. Barkley, Clyne, Ward Prose, even Rodriquez. All of them I'd take in a heartbeat and let Toure, Sagna, Jovetic, and Navas go.

Bayern do it with German players. Barca/Madrid with Spanish players. We let Luke Shaw go to the rags, Chambers to Arsenal. We need to look at this.

I've mentioned the English player problem plenty in the past - Unfortunately it seems difficult to discuss that as a genuine issue without replies like St Helens Blue, or people screaming about how they don't care what nationality they are as long as they play for City.

True to a point, and I don't think by fielding a team of English players we'll suddenly win the league with games to spare and conquer Europe, but I also don't think it's a coincidence that as you point out, the best German teams are full of Germans, the best Spanish teams are full of Spaniards, and the long term success of the rags (spit) was built on cores of English players. Might be worth taking a minute to consider two of our most committed players in Kompany and Zab are fully integrated into mancunian life; They're not just visiting. Sometimes to get you over that final hurdle you need a little more than skill or tactics - Why do you think the military make such a big deal of fighting for your country? You need to give players a reason larger than themselves to win things as a collective, and it's something with such a fragmented group I don't think we have.

WE would all love to see a collection of top class English players as the core of the team, but sadly at the moment due to the old problem of lack of player development at junior level there are only a few decent English players good enough to compete at European level. Until we address that problem we will never have the solution ! look at all the other 'English' clubs in the CL, barely an Englishman amongst them, it's not just us !

 

[IanBishopsHaircut]

We have won the league twice in 3 seasons...hardly underperforming

There are some right fannies on here

So we have not got it right in the CL yet...it will come

The way some of you wet wipes are deconstructing our players you would think we had 11 Gerry Creaney's in our squad

Three words

Get A Grip

We're at a point where we need to succeed in Europe, or perform at a decent level, and the players aren't trying. That indicates trouble

Self entitled bollocks

We don't 'need' to succeed in Europe at all...It would be 'nice' to succeed in Europe yes, but there are many teams who have not won a bean...my mate's a carlisle fan

Show a bit of humility ffs

Unless you are winning the CL it's all irrelevent...we are not winning it any time soon so cool your beans...Rome wasn't built in a day

 

[Tricky_Trev]

Bring back Garry Cook

 

[DenisLawBackHeel74]

1. Yes, but we should go further and form a consortium of teams and start our own CL
2. Yes he should, MP inherited much of this mess already and he's done a good job so far
3. No because it's a long term investment

 

[Manchester_lalala]

Bring back Garry Cook

I dare anyone to bite at this.

 

[momo88]

What worries me more than anything atm, is the infamous "holistic" approach. The idea is that every team in the City group is going to play in the same way, right? And that particular way is dictated by the owner and board right? A manager is brought in expecting to follow that way.

But what if that style of football is the wrong one? I think our owner and our chairman might have watched Barcelona a few years ago, saw the best assembled football team in history and figured "that's the way we are going to play". But it doesn't work, even Barcelona has been found out the past two years.

Every great side I watch these days, is built on insanely high pressure and speed in abundance. Two features severely missing from our style of play, especially pace.

So I hope instead of buying new players to fit our desired style, we look at the squad we have, make a few additions, two or three, and come up with an efficient gameplan. Our players are good enough to be dominant in 95% or our games, no matter if we plat at home, away, in domestic cups or in the CL.

Bring in tenacity and desire to our midfield, Barkley for example. Add pace, directness and finishing to our left side, Reus for example, and we will have one of the best sides in Europe.
And we really need a new lb.

Did Barca play this crap 44 2 with yaya toure in the middle ?
Did Barca lose the ball on counter ?

Did Barca face Dumbia the New PELE made in City defence ? :)

City should start playing a high tempo game with accurate long passing instead of 1 yard pass it work against some teams but not all especially those who want to give it a go

 

[MeatHunterrr]

What worries me more than anything atm, is the infamous "holistic" approach. The idea is that every team in the City group is going to play in the same way, right? And that particular way is dictated by the owner and board right? A manager is brought in expecting to follow that way.

But what if that style of football is the wrong one? I think our owner and our chairman might have watched Barcelona a few years ago, saw the best assembled football team in history and figured "that's the way we are going to play". But it doesn't work, even Barcelona has been found out the past two years.

Every great side I watch these days, is built on insanely high pressure and speed in abundance. Two features severely missing from our style of play, especially pace.

So I hope instead of buying new players to fit our desired style, we look at the squad we have, make a few additions, two or three, and come up with an efficient gameplan. Our players are good enough to be dominant in 95% or our games, no matter if we plat at home, away, in domestic cups or in the CL.

Bring in tenacity and desire to our midfield, Barkley for example. Add pace, directness and finishing to our left side, Reus for example, and we will have one of the best sides in Europe.
And we really need a new lb.

Did Barca play this crap 44 2 with yaya toure in the middle ?
Did Barca lose the ball on counter ?

Did Barca face Dumbia the New PELE made in City defence ? :)

City should start playing a high tempo game with accurate long passing instead of 1 yard pass it work against some teams but not all especially those who want to give it a go

Bang on. Barca didn't play unbalanced shit 442. They played 4-3-3 which would be good for us as well, numbers on midfield and attack. Gives control and not vulnerable to counters. But City do things the hard way.

 

[BillyShears]

Start by being difficult to beat. Keep it compact. Hell just do something different in an attempt to break the pattern. It certainly cannot be worse than then this cycle of rinse and repeat and hope for the best approach.

Agree with much of what you've posted but you need to forget the above. Football managers don't suddenly change a career's worth of beliefs because of poor results. Most of them weirdly enough prefer to eventually lose their jobs. Maybe it's the arrogance you need to be a manager.