The problem about posting as late as this as a reaction to what we served up on Saturday, is that I'm looking at it through the distorting lens of the equally dismal performances served up in the meantime, by Liverpool, United, and, to a lesser extent, Arsenal. And that inevitably makes me feel mellower about it. It's an optical illusion, though, and I'm going to stand by my first analysis, written on Saturday night.
Taking that game as a whole, it can be soberly said that we were garbage. Villa richly deserved a point, at least. They were sharp into the tackle, they were up for it, they were stringing one-touch passes together accurately and quickly, allowing them to break out and come at us at pace. Benteke owned Mangala. And anyone else who went up for the ball. Fernando, Demichelis, whoever. By my count, he won just about every single ball in the air that he went for.
We were gifted a clownish goal at the start. That happens. We gifted them a close-to-clownish goal for their second. That, too, happens. But after our first, not only did we completely fail to capitalise on it, but we looked clueless, especially in midfield. And up front, Sergio had one of the worst games he’s had in a blue shirt. So that didn’t help. Our first half was dire.
Somewhat better after the break. At 2-0, though, we should be comfortable. We should be simply seeing the game out. Great strike from Kolarov who, apart from that, seemed to be busy misdirecting passes, when he wasn’t simply hitting them into touch. Can you afford the luxury of having such a limited player on the pitch just for the dead ball situations, which he is clearly good at? Seriously doubt it…
But the single most striking thing about that performance, for me, was the way our game completely fell apart after their first goal. 2-1 obviously isn’t as comfortable as 2-0, but a team that has self-belief still knows how to see out the situation. On the contrary, it was as if, collectively, everyone said “Shit, they’ve found us out at last. Tin hats on, down into the bunker, this last twenty minutes is going to be a shitstorm”. And it was. We just had nothing to offer at that point. We couldn’t string three passes together, and all our challenges on their men when they had the ball were like dogs biting at thin air. For a longish stretch of the game, Villa had 72% possession, against our 38%. Those were the stats according to the telly. Who does that to City at the Etihad? Ever? I don’t think even Barcelona and Bayern had those figures.
Was Sergio fouled in the box? Should it have been a penalty? Well, in fairness, we should equally ask — was their third goal offside?
Bad. Mentally, there’s something badly wrong with this team now. Great result for us at the Hawthorns. Looks like we’ve secured top four, who knows, may even get third place. I’ll take those three points and run like a thief.
But changes are coming. I’m not sure how much effect the World Cup had on our season. Or the mess with Yaya. Or the other kind of mess with Mangala’s late arrival. But all of that’s way, way back, now. The truly lousy performances have been in the second half of the season.
Two decent performances to pick out in the dross. Navas has taken an absurd amount of criticism on this forum. He is always honest, he always works his socks off. I don’t say he was great, but he was one of our better players. And Fernandinho, of course. Thank fuck in the sky that we’ve got him for next year.
Hats off to Villa. You know, they could do it against the Arse. Could just happen…
