Swansea (H) Pre-Match Thread

[cibaman]

Agreed Teddy. Yaya has been excellent; I was concerned in Wednesday night given Yaya plus 5 attack minded players, but he coped admirably and West Ham never threatened before 3 0

So far, no opposition manager has targeted Yaya when he's played as the single pivot. That wont last.

 

[Chris in London]

Its how it looked to me as well, but individually we were more mobile positionally, the front 3 moved into all positions, the midfield 2 swapped, Yaya dropped between the 2 CB.s, and the 2 FB's (your RH and LH) tucked in when he did that, it looked a solid formation, if this is how Pep is going to have us playing its going to be very exciting.

Completely agree.
There was a fluidity about us on Wednesday night that I thought was breath taking. I got a bit pissed off with the media (no change there) when they bleated on about how bad WHU were - they were actually in a good run of form and didn't IMO play particularly badly, but they just couldn't cope with us, and we punished their mistakes with utter ruthlessness. We made them look bad - is all.

Going back to football in Granddad's time there was a time when (I think it was Arsenal) started dropping their centre half back between the full backs - it's why commentators refer to people who play in VK's position as a centre Half. When Arsenal did it I think it was called the WM formation - or, 3-2-2-3 as we might call it now. When Yaya was dropping deep and, as you say, Sagna and Kola were tucking in it again reminded me of that.

Funny how in football, like life, there are usually historical parallels if you look for them.

 

[Gabriel]

So far, no opposition manager has targeted Yaya when he's played as the single pivot. That wont last.

That used to be more a problem when we never used the goalkeeper as the eleventh outfield player and the pivot remained in one place. But now we do, and because Toure can drop deeper between the defenders- hell he was even in both full back positions on Wednesday, the risk of targeting him as the pivot becomes even greater. Get it wrong, just once, and one pass releases all that pace on your exposed defence.

 

[BringBackSwales]

So far, no opposition manager has targeted Yaya when he's played as the single pivot. That wont last.

Haven't got a scooby what a single pivot is, but at that stage I assume the likes of kdb and Dave, and the wide players will help out, and the full backs will push inside; West Ham will have wanted to do it, they just couldn't get the ball off us

 

[BLUEMATT23]

Pep also confirmed that he has a fully fit squad (minus Gündogan) for the visit of Swansea, with no new injury concerns

Hasn't Delph injured his fInger nail Karen?

 

[Bewar3them00n]

We need to maintain this form we're in against Swansea. Too many times we've won impressively, and the next game everyone is expecting a straightforward win, but we end up fluffing our lines ( Snderland 3-3 in our first title win springs to mind)
If we play like we did midweek, then I can't see Swansea being able to hold out against the speed and mobility of that front trio, and if Vinny is back, then even more reason to think our defence has started to tighten up, especially with Willy carrying out his duties so well, saves, decent distribution, no giving the ball away needlessly.
I hope Pep continues with Willy, and let's that trio of Sané Sterling and Jesus another run out, get the job done by half time, then give Aguero a crack, as the pace in this side is breathtaking, Sané is going to tear defences apart, and Sterling will get better, and Jesus is just 19!!

 

[kaz7]

Hasn't Delph injured his fInger nail Karen?

He is on life support as we speak,broken nails are very serious

 

[kaz7]

We need to maintain this form we're in against Swansea. Too many times we've won impressively, and the next game everyone is expecting a straightforward win, but we end up fluffing our lines ( Snderland 3-3 in our first title win springs to mind)
If we play like we did midweek, then I can't see Swansea being able to hold out against the speed and mobility of that front trio, and if Vinny is back, then even more reason to think our defence has started to tighten up, especially with Willy carrying out his duties so well, saves, decent distribution, no giving the ball away needlessly.
I hope Pep continues with Willy, and let's that trio of Sané Sterling and Jesus another run out, get the job done by half time, then give Aguero a crack, as the pace in this side is breathtaking, Sané is going to tear defences apart, and Sterling will get better, and Jesus is just 19!!

If he starts juliet then all bets are off

 

[teddykgb]

The pressing is the key. When we turn teams over in the midfield like our first goal midweek then we can spring much more dangerous attacks. We are our least lethal when we only have the ball and have to work to find an opening and inevitably throw in some hopeless ball from wide to a bunch of midgets who can't do much with it. We are at our best when we are able to dispossess the other team in the midfield and break forward. We have too much skill to sit deep and play on the counter but many of our highest quality chances will come when we do trap a team with the press and then launch into an attack at that moment.

To an extent, playing Sterling and Sane has resulted in a bit higher frequency in change of possession. This is riskier, of course, but in the end I think it is inviting teams onto us just a little bit more and it is helping. I'll be really interested in seeing what Pep does in regards to Yaya and Fernandinho. I think this 4-3-3 that we've been working out of really has suited the squad. He could try to become more stout and insert Fernandinho or Yaya further forward into one of KDB or Silva's roles. Or he could simply rotate Fernandinho and Yaya in the deeper position. I don't think we can afford to revert to a 4-2-x-x setup where both play very deep because I think that was leading to some of the gaps we were seeing which led to ineffective pressing and large gaps in the midfield.

 

[balotelli's back pocket]

The football purist inside me wants to see this
Bravo
Dinho Kompany Stones
Toure
Sterling Silva De Bruyne Sane
Aguero Jesus

score 5 goals in the first half then pass it about for an hour,