Will we win the league this season?

IronsideKozuch said:
The reactions are absurd. Development is a long-term process, and it requires a broader perspective. Then again, football is entertainment, and entertainment is emotion, so after a defeat people feel sad and negative.

I rewatched the Villa game, and Pep is right — we were better than the scoreline suggests. Villa have been much improved recently, they have quality players. They didn’t create much danger — maybe they didn’t need to — but there really weren’t that many counter-attacks, which is a good sign. Playing away at Villa is always a tough fixture. We had several genuinely excellent chances: Haaland’s 1-on-1, Haaland’s header in the second half, the marginal offside on Haaland’s goal, Foden’s shot blocked by Onana’s face, Savinho’s double shot — the second of which was cleared in an absurdly lucky way by their defender. Any of those could have been goals and change the dynamics instantly.

Right now Arsenal look out of reach, but it’s still too early to rule out our dreams — and honestly, why would we? Regardless of the Premier League, there are still cups to win. For example, I would consider finishing 2nd in the league and winning the FA Cup an enormous success. Even more so the UCL — in a two-legged knockout format, with Haaland and Don, I think it’s more achievable than people assume.

We’re undergoing a squad rebuild. Over the last 10 months half the team has been changed, including parting ways with Premier League legends like KDB, Ederson and (to a lesser extent) Grealish. Experienced players like Gündoğan and Akanji have gone. We have lots of new players who are adapting, or still very young and only now breaking through to the top level (Savinho, Bobb). We don’t have Rodri, and against Villa we didn’t have Nico until the 60th minute.

And even so, we’re still one of the best teams — 1 loss in our last 10 matches. We were two minutes away from taking 3 points away at Arsenal, who are in the form of their lives. Let’s be honest: apart from Arsenal, no one in the league looks out of reach, including Liverpool.

Cherki and Stones are back, Nico, Marmoush, Aït-Nouri, Khusanov are coming back, and Rodri will return at some stage.

From here, things can only get better — it’s almost a certainty.
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I agree with most of this but both teams were very poor at the weekend. We could have easily won the game because Villa were there for the taking.
 
Jonathan Gunn said:
We need two new elite strikers.

City need a clear out in January:
Bobb
Savinho
Gonzalez
Nunes
Ake
Reijndeers
Lewis

We also need someone in to take a corner.
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I think Gonzalez and Nunes don't deserve the chop but a good case could be made for getting rid of the others. It won't happen though but 2 or 3 might go in the summer.
 
IronsideKozuch said:
The reactions are absurd. Development is a long-term process, and it requires a broader perspective. Then again, football is entertainment, and entertainment is emotion, so after a defeat people feel sad and negative.

I rewatched the Villa game, and Pep is right — we were better than the scoreline suggests. Villa have been much improved recently, they have quality players. They didn’t create much danger — maybe they didn’t need to — but there really weren’t that many counter-attacks, which is a good sign. Playing away at Villa is always a tough fixture. We had several genuinely excellent chances: Haaland’s 1-on-1, Haaland’s header in the second half, the marginal offside on Haaland’s goal, Foden’s shot blocked by Onana’s face, Savinho’s double shot — the second of which was cleared in an absurdly lucky way by their defender. Any of those could have been goals and change the dynamics instantly.

Right now Arsenal look out of reach, but it’s still too early to rule out our dreams — and honestly, why would we? Regardless of the Premier League, there are still cups to win. For example, I would consider finishing 2nd in the league and winning the FA Cup an enormous success. Even more so the UCL — in a two-legged knockout format, with Haaland and Don, I think it’s more achievable than people assume.

We’re undergoing a squad rebuild. Over the last 10 months half the team has been changed, including parting ways with Premier League legends like KDB, Ederson and (to a lesser extent) Grealish. Experienced players like Gündoğan and Akanji have gone. We have lots of new players who are adapting, or still very young and only now breaking through to the top level (Savinho, Bobb). We don’t have Rodri, and against Villa we didn’t have Nico until the 60th minute.

And even so, we’re still one of the best teams — 1 loss in our last 10 matches. We were two minutes away from taking 3 points away at Arsenal, who are in the form of their lives. Let’s be honest: apart from Arsenal, no one in the league looks out of reach, including Liverpool.

Cherki and Stones are back, Nico, Marmoush, Aït-Nouri, Khusanov are coming back, and Rodri will return at some stage.

From here, things can only get better — it’s almost a certainty.
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Next three games determines the season for me. 7 to 9 points and we can go on a run and challenge 3 or 4 and we are effectively out of the race. I am sticking with my prediction of 3rd place come May. As for next year the present lot may not be good enough so improvements are needed.
 
bobbyowenquiff said:
I agree with most of this but both teams were very poor at the weekend. We could have easily won the game because Villa were there for the taking.
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Im not sure, I mean it can always go both ways.

Villa were there for the taking because we played well and created plenty of chances.

I think we also tend to underestimate Aston Villa a bit at the moment. They were poor at the start of the season, but they still have most of the players who nearly knocked PSG out of the Champions League last season. They won at home, and at home they’re simply dangerous for every team in the world—they’ll be dangerous for Arsenal or Liverpool as well.

Lets see how things gonna pan out, but narrow defeat against AV at Villa Park is not a sign to waved a white flag.
 
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Gray said:
We will be lucky to finish in the top 4.
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We finished 3rd last season and we were way worse + we've got players coming back from injuries now as well.

Teams like Bournemouth and Sunderland won't last at the top either.

Also worth noting that we had no pre-season and some iffy results early on (Spurs/Brighton) shouldn't have been a big surprise.
 
Damocles said:
They've won nothing! And they're certainly not dominant after a few games.
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They haven’t improved to the level required to compete with another genuine title challenging team where you require over 90 points to win the league.

It’s just their time to get lucky, like Liverpool did last year, where their rivals all fall apart and they can coast to a title with a points total in the mid-low 80’s.

They’ll 1-0 their way to the league title and probably won’t lose another game doing it.
 
Perhaps our squad is stronger than we think? We made 10 changes from the Villa according to the BBC match report and as Slot said in his press conference we were still able to field a strong side.

We know Arsenal have that strength in depth. Last night showed that City have that too. At this time last season, City could not have made 10 changes from their side at the weekend and win. In November 2024 we looked out on our feet with the same players forced to play at the weekend and in midweek and we couldn't cope. Whether we are at the level of Arsenal is to be seen, but we are stronger than 12 months ago.
 
Damocles said:
They've won nothing! And they're certainly not dominant after a few games.
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I've watched nearly all Arsenal P/L matches. That you think they're not the best side in the P/L by some distance - I 100% disagree.

Arsenal are always solid on defense and the opposition never looks like scoring. Meanwhile Arsenal are often questionable going forward, at least against top sides (I think that this cannot but improve), and yet, they still manage to score - often from set pieces.

And a goal for Arsenal - is almost a guaranteed win for them - such is their defense.
 
I dont think we are good enough, theres something missing, but if we are the only challengers to Arsenal and are still in the race come Feb/Mar theres always a chance against them
 
dublinblue12 said:
I dont think we are good enough, theres something missing,
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There are a few things missing:

Pure creators - I’ve mentioned before that Cherki created the most chances (3.7) per 90-mins in Europe’s top five leagues last season, and in the Europa League he created the most chances (46), most big chances (15) and got the most g+a (12) and he played three fewer games than Utd+Spurs players who made the final.

Goalscorers other than Haaland - Marmoush scored more goals (15) than Sesko (13) and Woltermade (12) and got more g+a combined (24) than Wirtz (22) in the Bundesliga last season and he left that league in January. Marmoush (7 PL goals) outscored all of Doku, Grealish, Gündoğan and Savinho combined (6 PL goals between them) in just five months with us last season.

Rodri - Godri!

^ all three of these players have been missing and are big things that we are missing as a team this season.

In recent years we’ve also lost creators and goalscorers in De Bruyne, Gündoğan, Álvarez, Mahrez, Cancelo, even Palmer and even McAtee popped up with as many PL goals for us last season as Doku did in 1,200 fewer minutes.
And mostly replaced them with players who are neither creators nor goalscorers.

Doku (0), Savinho (0), Bobb (0), BSilva (1), Foden (1), Reijnders (1)… aren’t scoring goals (Salah - who’s been crap - has scored as many as those 6 players combined) and other than Foden and Doku those same players aren’t creating chances either. And considering the minutes they’ve played (Foden 533; Doku 476) and the possession we have (1st with 61.7%), those two haven’t created that much (Salah has created as much - all three of them have created 16 chances this season - and again he’s been crap!)

And, again, there’s no Rodri.

There needs to be a collective step up from all our attackers in creating and scoring goals, but getting Cherki and Marmoush in the team will help that as they are what the other players aren’t.

If we can then get Foden creating and scoring at his best levels and get Rodri anywhere near fit, we’ll be a different outfit.

If everyone was fit, this would be my starting XI in many home games:

—————————Donnarumma————————
Nunes———Dias———Gvardiol———O’Reilly
———————————Rodri———————————
——Cherki——————Foden——————Doku
———————Haaland———Marmoush————

And the for the tougher games and away games:

—————————Donnarumma————————
Khusanov———Dias———Gvardiol———O’Reilly
—————————Rodri——Nico——————————
——Cherki——————Foden———Marmoush——
———————————Haaland———————————

(Obviously there’s rotation, suspensions and injuries to take into consideration, not saying that XI/XIII every week).
 
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mancityscot said:
arsenal will steam ahead, most complete side by far.
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I would agree that they are the strongest side in the league but 69% (11 of 16, https://www.skysports.com/football/...s-in-modern-era-as-man-city-struggle-to-adapt) of Arsenal's goals have come from set pieces. That suggests to me that they are not a great side.

We all expect, and I think Arsenal fans would too, that if Arsenal are put under pressure in the crunch part of the season, they might struggle. The game is played in the head as well as on the pitch. You are not allowing for change. City still have Rodri, Marmoush and Cherki to come into our side. You need resilience to win titles. City went to Swansea, made 10 changes from the weekend, and pretty much looked like the usual City side. We couldn't have done that last season.
 
Marvin. said:
I would agree that they are the strongest side in the league but 69% (11 of 16, https://www.skysports.com/football/...s-in-modern-era-as-man-city-struggle-to-adapt) of Arsenal's goals have come from set pieces. That suggests to me that they are not a great side.

We all expect, and I think Arsenal fans would too, that if Arsenal are put under pressure in the crunch part of the season, they might struggle. The game is played in the head as well as on the pitch. You are not allowing for change. City still have Rodri, Marmoush and Cherki to come into our side. You need resilience to win titles. City went to Swansea, made 10 changes from the weekend, and pretty much looked like the usual City side. We couldn't have done that last season.
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There isn't a shadow of doubt that we're a better side than last season. That doesn't mean that Arsenal aren't significantly better, too. There is no particular reason why the set-piece strategy won't continue to bear fruit. And as long as they are hellishly difficult to score against — a run of injuries could change that, certainly a run even comparable to the run that we suffered last season, but by its nature we're talking about a complete imponderable — I don't really see why they won't win the league. They're certainly not a great side. They wouldn't even hold a candle to the Henry/Bergkamp/Vieira side. But they are the most plausible candidates to be champions.
Sure, things could change. They could also stay the same. I'm slightly leaning towards the latter outcome, setting emotion and what I want aside, and on purely rational grounds.
 
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