Sporting CP (A) | CL | Post Match Thread

Feels like 16/17 all over again, pep has not been backed at all in the transfer window and it’s causing devastating consequences. People thought my criticism of the squad was hyperbole after the Bournemouth game, well unfortunately I’ve been proven correct.

The simple fact is despite having arguably the greatest manager of all time, our squad is so poor I do not believe we will get Top 4 this season unless we sign at least 2 players in the Jan transfer window.
Anyone who constantly talks about themselves usually cannot be trusted. You seem to be ticking that box
 
I actually predicted a 4-1 result last night, we were 1-0 up when we were going to bed and Sporting equalized as I was going upstairs. Admittedly I predicted 4-1 to us but still...

Oh well, onwards and upwards.
 
not nice to lose. Thankfully 2 of the recent losses have been quite meaningless competition-wise, i'd wager all 3 have actually, but obviously it builds a picture of bad form and tactical issues that are getting repetitive.

i thought the 1st half had a lot of decent stuff - Foden looked on it, Savinho's movement was good - but going in level was a bit silly but we've seen that before with City, dominance turning into a good win later in the game. This time is backfired in conjunction with a very shonky looking back line, the shape of it at times looked like a fucked accordion.

Haaland's penalty was a gift, that we spurned, but in truth we cannot continue to paper over cracks. The game was for winning in the first half, the second was a brain fart.

there we have it, we may even lose to Brighton as well, so i suggest people harden themselves a touch and get behind the team. I reckon we wont go into the break without a fight, but i dont think we'll see an instant fix to some on pitch issues. It might take a couple of months but we'll be with Liverpool at the top in a race, come March.
Savinho got into some brilliant positions but didn't make the right decisions, that was so frustrating.
That game should have been over after half an hour.
 
In danger of getting stuck in a loop. As a Club, we’re running out of players and as a Manager Pep is running out of ideas.

How about this - ditch the suicidal high line Baldy…!
 
All the penalties were soft and very few would've been surprised if none were given.

Without them the game and outcome could've been quite different.

However when they come along they have to be scored. If ours had again the outcome could've be quite different.

At present we're like the best gang in town whose top boy has been knocked out......the invinciblity and confidence has been shaken & no one wants to step forward and take on the role.

Rumours of our death are greatly exaggerated !!

CTID.
 
Feels like 16/17 all over again, pep has not been backed at all in the transfer window and it’s causing devastating consequences. People thought my criticism of the squad was hyperbole after the Bournemouth game, well unfortunately I’ve been proven correct.

The simple fact is despite having arguably the greatest manager of all time, our squad is so poor I do not believe we will get Top 4 this season unless we sign at least 2 players in the Jan transfer window.
You've 107 posts in 8 years on this forum. Funnily enough posting when we are in a bad patch.

Also the "I've been proven correct" quote is hilarious, You are another poster/wum that's loves the "I told you so" attitude.
 
I thought it best to sleep on this lose before posting and not make a knee jerk reaction
A- you can loose many battles, but still win the war. we dont loose anything in november lets wait till the end of the season before panicing
B- any team with our injuries would not be on full charge so we have to accept games like this
c- ignire the press etc this was not a total trashing, it was a bad lose but we should have been out of site before they scored. unfortunetly you get games like this
 
As soon as Pep selected a player with hardly any first team experience against a very highly rated no 9 we were doomed.
Did I hear Matterface say the rags have found the new GPC?
To be honest I was happy to see the young lad start, There's no way Walker or Ake could have been selected after the Bournemouth performance.
 
I really enjoyed the game, if not the result.
The thread is filled with emotion, and people saying really daft stuff, as often happens after a loss, or even dropped points.
We lost this game in a second-half spell of about ten minutes.
We had 20 shots on goal to their eight.
We could easily have been leading by 2-3 goals at half-time.
ATM, we are finding it much harder to score goals than the opponents are.
The key issue is the loss of Stones, Dias, Rodri, Bobb, Grealish, Walker, and the lack of fitness of Akanji, Ake, and DeBruyne. That is a uniquely bad injury list, and will not continue indefinitely.
We are somewhere near the top of the league and also likely to qualify for the CL.
Are other, older fans like me...a shrug of the shoulders and move on?
Exactly… some people forget how badly the treble season seemed to be going in January. Injuries don’t just rob us of that player, others have to play out of position or cover.
 
Exactly… some people forget how badly the treble season seemed to be going in January. Injuries don’t just rob us of that player, others have to play out of position or cover.
While I get this it’s worth remembering how much better and younger the treble winning squad was.
 
This image sums up what's going wrong at the moment - it's the build up to the equaliser.

Bernardo, having put the ball out of play trying to switch, then makes a 60 yard sprint to try & press. He's now in line with Haaland.

It leaves Gvardiol two on one, and then in turn allows the run of 17 to totally disrupt our backline, with Akanji shifting to cover and Gyokeres goal side of JSP.


It's not for the want of trying, but players & management are making small mistakes which are compounded by the high line and how aggressive we are in wanting to win the ball.

I do think even if we had a full eleven out there, teams & coaches have improved in playing against presses.

A number of teams are being successful at the moment by maximising transitions. I've stated a number of times in my posts that our press has been overly aggressive this season at times and it requires perfection to pull it off.


With the mixture of injuries and then a collective head loss in the second half, this result had echoes of Leicester 2020.

I do think the issues are fixable, but we're in this odd place where it's Guardiola needing to respond to innovation rather than teams responding to him (like the Stones & Cancelo position changes down the years)



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