Get in the queue yankee boy. Us English boys first.Ruben Dias is absolutely fucking IMMENSE. I never thought I could love a player more than Vinnie but I’m rapidly becoming interested in a passionate love affair with this man.
Great post mate.Not that we have much experience of CL semi final's to go off but, I was certain that PSG buoyed by beating the mighty Bayern would unleash a storm upon us in the 1st half, apart from their goal, a rather uncharacteristic one for us to concede we handled them well. A telling stat, Ederson had more touches than Mbappe, who I thought was marshalled quite magnificently by Ruben and Stones. Neymar flickered like a candle in the wind, a few moments of sublimity, followed by more of diving petulance. The nadir for him came when Zincho executed a perfectly timed tackle on him after his introduction and after that he lapsed into pettiness. What a shame as he is a magnificent footballer. Their most potent threat was Di Maria, the ex rag looked very capable of tearing us apart yet slowly disappeared and ended on the periphery acting as petulant as his team mates.
If one incident signalled our second half dominance it was Gyeue's disgusting tackle on Ilkay. Moments before I had wrote on our whats app group that PSG were losing their mettle, they looked unnerved, fearful almost. Gundo was orchestrating the game, Kev was lighting it up with his brilliance and Mahrez and Foden were taking the game to them in a way they will not experience very often in Ligue Une,
Veratti is a fabulous footballer, the heartbeat of their team and we slowly strangled his room to manouevre , we passed around him and as the game grew our metronomic passing game left them chasing shadows.
Much was being made on the TV about us lacking a centre forward, there may be a half truth in that, yes we could have scored more with a predator in the box, but would we have dominated possession like we did if we were a man lighter in the midfield. Would we have been able to close down Veratti, probably not and with him open then there forwards would come in to play. In the 2nd half they were rarely a threat and remember we weren't playing against Port Vale, this was the exulted pairing of Mbappe and Neymar, half a Billion pounds worth of footballing genius. TV punditry is still living in the days of big centre forwards and 4-4 fucking 2 to use Mike Bassets famous phrase.
The introduction of Zincho was pivotal for us, he is becoming a fantastic footballer, never lets us down, uses the ball intelligently and he shows a rare passion for our club, I am not knocking Cancelo, but he had a night to forget but as he has been so good this season, I will forgive him 60minutes of ordinary.
A cautionary note, this is far from over, we may have 2 vital away goals, but if there was ever a team capable of scoring 2 at the Etihad it is PSG and Neymar and Mbappe will be a threat. I am certain though we will not be going into the game thinking it is won, there is still a long way to go, but for the moment we can savour possibly our finest night in the CL.
After all, we have had worse nights being Blues.
Another great post.I think we were massively fortunate in this game, and we should be aware of this. Against Spurs we dominated the ball but scored through a set-piece. Today, again we dominated the ball for long periods in the 2nd half and were able to create some very fluid passages of play on the outside of their box, but rarely did we threaten their goal. There was one must score moment from a PSG error in the 1st half when Bernardo passed to Foden and he struck it too centrally.
PSG are in a way the counter-opposite to City. Their threat are their forwards in Mbappe and Neymar, whereas our offensive talent is that we have 5 fantastic midfielders in Foden, GUndogan, Bernardo, Mahrez and KDB but we are forever massed against their defence outside their penalty box free-wheeling forever. It is beautiful to watch when we have a lead but frustrating if we need a goal. Nothing came of all our midfield play at Wembley, and nothing came from it last night either. You could say the same about PSG too (took a corner).
Our free-kick was incredibly fortunate. Mahrez can try that a 100 times and will never be able to do that again. What was he trying to do? GO round it, go over it? poor execution that came off simply because he hit it hard and on target.
We got lucky. Same as Spurs did when they came to City in that Q/F. But you need luck.
I think we have make a virtue from a fundamental weakness in our side...the lack of a centre-forward. Our ability to control the ball prevents Mbappe and Neymars from hurting us because it means we dominate the ball but we don't carry the same lethal threat in the penalty area that PSG have.
When PSG have Neymar and Mbappe on the edge of our penalty area, then they have the capacity to shift the ball really quick and get a runner in on the end of a cross e.g., Mbappe to Veratti that he missed by inches. I don't see this City side carrying this kind of threat.
The ability though to suffocate a side by preventing them from building up play, and to monopolise the ball though are huge pluses.
If Foden and/other players develop the Neymar/Ronaldo/Lampard ability to carry a real goal threat without being an out and out centre-forward then this absence of a central stiker does not matter.
In the Summer we have a crucial decision to make. Do we continue as we are, or do we sacrifice a forward to carry more threat in the box but at the same time lose control over possession? How many times do Bernardo and Mahrez cut back inside and float lovely balls in but rarely do these crosses have much threat. Against Villa that's how Rodri scored (from a Bernardo ball).
The plus side is though that most games end up 30:70 possession for City and what can an opponen do with so little possession? PSG are very dangeorous because they are more clinical, or efficient with their 30% possession.