I think they thought they had FDJ locked down. In the end he 'chose' Barcelona. City put it out afterwards that they weren't going to pay what Barcelona paid in fee or wages, but that isn't the point because he chose to go to Barcelona and made the decision for City.
I'm really not arsed about how 'bad' a buy Rodri is. I just want them to identify that they have to sign another player in that position. What they do with Rodri is neither here nor there. Fernandinho's definitely off so he'll definitely be a useful squad player if nobody wants to pay money for him.
Obviously I could be mental, but I think that the whole 'double pivot' thing isn't about Gundo/Rodri. It's that he doesn't trust Foden or Bernardo in that position that only leaves him with those two and KDB as his go to selection. In a weird way I sort of get it with Bernardo because he's been so bad and so ineffective it's painful to watch. But the Phil thing seems a bit harsh. He may not be David Silva in terms of his game intelligence, but his physicality and dynamism more than makes up for it.
The season is long and I don't think even if he wants to he'll be able to play Gundo/Rodri all season. At some point he'll have to 'trust' one of the others.
We're 8th in the league with players he does trust. Maybe it's time for him to accept he's misjudging his squad and if he's really unhappy with senior pros, givee the kids a go, backing Foden for a run of games, giving Doyle and Palmer time because 2bh, we wouldn't be much lower than 8th with them playing in most games and we'd be building for the future and making a statement of our long-term intent.
After 12 games compared to previous seasons under Pep:
20/21: 8th, W5 D5 L2, GS:18, GC:12, GD:+6, Pts: 20/36, PPG: 1.67, GS P/G: 1.5, GC P/G: 1, Win%: 41.7.
19/20: 4th, W8 D1 L3, GS: 35, GC: 13. GD: +22, Pts: 25/36, PPG: 2.08, GS P/G: 2.92, GC P/G: 1.08, Win %: 66.7
18/19: 1st, W10 D2 L0, GS: 36, GC: 5, GD: +31, Pts: 32/36, PPG: 2.67, GS P/G: 3, GC P/G: 0.42, Win %: 83.3.
17/18: 1st, W11 D1 L0, GS: 40, GC: 7, GD: +33, Pts: 34/36, PPG: 2.83, GS P/G: 3.33, GC P/G: 0.58, Win %: 91.7
16/17: 3rd, W8 D3 L1, GS: 27, GC: 11, GD: +16, Pts: 27/36, PPG: 2.25, GS P/G: 2.25, GC P/G: 0.92, Win%: 66.7.
This is a whole other level of bad under Pep, and you're right he gets judged on his past record. That's the benchmark and statement of ambition the club have set. At least if it was that record but we'd gone for a public policy of blooding youth early in the season because of the short turnaround and resting our key players there would be something to hold onto. Instead, we have to try and muster enthusiasm for Gundogan, Plodri, Mahrez, Sterling and Jesus and a bewildered, knackered and exasperated Kev. It's not enjoyable on its own terms and merit so the alternative is to reflect on the past 12 years, a global pandemic and not really be bothered anymore.
Like Morecambe & Wise on ITV it's just like "meh, I might watch but it's not the same". The club will be fine and there's little jeopardy outside of a UEFA court case so that side of supporting the club has gone, the only other side was experiencing the greatest team we'll ever see in our lifetimes. Now you're on the other side of that, and we've been hamstrung by VAR and off-field politics and positioning that we haven't crushed like we needed to, it's hard to find the "in" to rekindle that spark. Of course, it's bad "under Pep", there's no way of relating it to even the Hughes era let alone before, but the downside risk isn't there like in those days either, so it's hard to find something to hang your hat on in what seems a malaise throughout the club. I think people see negativity and criticism and sometimes miss that it's expressed in relation to City under Pep, rather than the overall experience of supporting City.
There's some rubbish being written about us at the moment, like we "mentally gave up early last season", yet we won 8/10 league games after lockdown, scoring 5 in four of the games, and 4 in two of the others, and we only conceded in 3 of them, scoring 34, and conceding just 4, I'd hate to think what we could do mentally switched on. Even the 2 games we didn't win (lost) were against 2 of the current top 6.
We've been disappointing so far this season (in the league) with too many draws, the football is certainly not the swash buckling stuff of our recent past, but we've only lost twice from 20 games in total, and have just had a run of 6 games without conceding a goal.
Far too much ridiculous pessimism around for me.
when it didn't matter. When it did matter v Lyon we caved again. We have not been the same squad since Jesus had his goal ruled v Spurs in the 2-2. We weren't right that day and haven't been since.
