Yaya, Aguero and Form

[Soulboy]

Hope you are well, soulboy.

Why is that we have a selection of talent returning - Ya Ya, Balotelli and Tevez - which should have our competitors quaking on their boots. Yet I can't shake the feeling that we're going to blow it?

And I agree about the selection of Zabaleta over Richards. Absolutely baffling.

Tevez could be just what we need to come off the bench in games like the Everton, Sunderland ones where we are running out of ideas. But he's a player who plays himself into form, so that could be a problem. He tends to get himself fit in matches and isn't a great trainer I believe.

I'm fine. Hope you are too. If you're out for th'Rovers game give us a shout...

Like you, there is a fear we seem to have hit the wall at this stage, and that baconface's mind games will see him pip us to it even though we are a vastly superior team in terms of ability. But ability alone will not win us the league. And hopefully Mancini has recognised that already.

I found it strange our line-up yesterday, we have no game for a fortnight (the Europa games can be left to the back-up players for me...) and we should have put out our strongest line up... but didn't. So why?

I hope Mancini doesn't bottle it at this stage and try to defend our way to the winning line. We can't sit back like we did for the last 5 minutes at Villa yesterday, as even as shite a team as Villa nearly scored against us in spite of the game being embarrassingly one-sided.

We have to up the tempo and be more clinical in front of goal. If we go one up front, then we need players who can also offer width and goalscoring options in the middle of the park.

Like I said previously, the return of these three players should be enough, but if it isn't then questions will have to be asked of the manager's abilities in this league to win the ultimate prize.

There can be no excuses if we don't win this league. We are the best team by a mile and only fear will stop us.

So will it be Mancini the brave? Or Mancini the bottler?

The next three months will define this club for years to come.

 

[TTS]

Great post OP.

I'd like to agree with an earlier poster that Balotelli's return will be more important than Yaya's. There are two reasons why we're struggling away from home: no width, and predictability. Mario can't remedy the first, but he can certainly help with the second.

 

[the blue panther]

Not that we really have any experience of being in this situation before - at all, ever, in any of our lives - but, only on a City forum would you find someone saying that, with City being 2 points clear at the top of the Premier League, with what is probably a record number of points after 25 games ( 6 more than United had at this time last year anyway), and with 3 extremely talented players coming back into their table topping squad, he has a feeling that we're going to blow it.
We broke the mould last season when we beat United in the cup semi, went on to win the FA Cup, then hammered them 6-1 at OT. Freedom of speech is fine, but, such pessimism is unwarranted.
United have been playing out of their skins lately in order to keep up with us whilst we've been off form. They have to keep that up for the rest of the season, keep Rooney fit - they are nothing without him - and have no howlers from a very porous defence and goalie.
You may hesitate to feel confident, but I certainly don't.
I know, I know - 'This is City, don't forget.....!!'
But, it's not the old City, is it!?

 

[pauljv92]

I can't help but feel that we've got "England World Cup syndrome" in regards to Yaya Toure. We seem to believe that his return will herald a return of the City at the beginning of the year, that we will be carving open teams left, right and centre.

I do think that he's a big part of how we play, but his absence is not to blame for our recent drop in form. In fact, the last time that Yaya was in the team we got beaten by Sunderland, and drew with West Brom. We did beat Liverpool 3-0 but the scoreline didn't tend to reflect the game. His magical powers did not seem to extend to these games.

Our real downward turn started around Christmas Day after we beat Stoke and has continued whether or not Yaya and Kolo were in the team.

I think that our dodgy form is more down to Aguero's misfiring than Yaya's absence, and he seems almost a shadow of the player that we saw in that Swansea game. He has gone from a guy full of confidence who plays with his feathers up, to a frustrated striker who seems to get really annoyed with himself after he misses a chance. Possibly for this reason, he is much more greedy in possession than he was originally and the directness that he brought to us has been lost.

This City team remind me of Arsenal in 2006 and it's a happy coincidence that we've recently become the first team to hit 60 points in 25 games since them. They finished third that season, so I wouldn't start counting our chickens yet as there's a long way to go and that team represents a stark warning from history about what happens once Plan A is cracked.

Many people were upset with the Villa teamsheet but I was actually quite relived. Our style of play is far too narrow and focused on short passes that defences understand that if they pressure us hard and sit deep, we are somewhat out of options. Against Villa, we seemed to set up with a bit more width and as people in the match thread said, we kept "twatting the ball long". A more direct style was just what we needed and I thought that we played very well over the course of 90 minutes. I absolutely don't buy the hate against Zab nor Kolarov and obviously don't see what others do here. I'd be happy to have them line up for us in a Champions League Final without worrying about it.

Yet again though, we failed to score from open play away from home. Since 5th November at QPR, we've scored once from open play away from home. That's once in seven games. I don't care which way you spin it, that's a worrying statistic.

I personally think that we've been struggling to break teams down an awful lot longer than we realise. I think we can go all the way back to the Napoli and Fulham games in September to spot the warning signs of what was coming. This isn't a bad run of form, it's an endemic problem which we have failed to address.

There's no easy answer to why we fail to break teams down and like most things in football, it tends to be a combination of numerous different factors. We don't have any wide players really and the ones that we do are either full backs or cut inside often. Our manager is notorious for creating very narrow teams and believes in the universality of players to create goalscoring opportunities. Our main focal point in attack looks frustrated at the moment and is snatching at chances, a bit like Robinho was after his return from injury; to use an Englishism, he's "trying too hard" at the moment. We struggle to break down counter attacks from pacey players which necessitates playing defensively minded players in the centre. We do not respond well to organised pressing. Our off the ball movement at times is shockingly poor for a team that regularly has 60%+ possession in a match. We do not take enough risks whilst in possession and do have neither the width nor directness to compensate for this.
Numerous different problems that all add to up to our worrying play style away from home.

I think we will win the title, and I think that we will hit 90 points doing so. At home, we're almost invincible, the only crack appearing against United and Liverpool in the cup games that are admittedly not our main focus for the year. Our away games are Swansea, Norwich, Newcastle, Arsenal, Wolves and Stoke. All of those teams outside of Stoke will have a go at us and give us the space to play in.

Mancini is one of those oxymoronic managers where he's both young and experienced at the same time. The thing that I'm not sure that he has quite learnt yet about English football is that sometimes you need to surrender possession to open the game up and allow your team the opportunity to work in some space. Plain and simply, the Stokes of this world do not exist in Italian football. The very hard working, high pressing ruggedly defensive game is a very English phenomenon, at least out of the top European leagues.
I don't think Mancini has ever won at the Britannia, perhaps someone can correct me? It's certainly a bogey ground for his City team as is Goodison and Molineux, we never seem to play very well there. All high pressing ruggedly defensive strong English teams.

Sitting in front of them and playing possession based football is their bread and butter and we need to play more like we did against Villa when we go there. My kingdom for a wide left winger and all that.

He's adapted to foibles of England before and I'm sure he will again but it doesn't half put a strain on the heart. This period up until we play Chelsea (Blackburn/Bolton at home, Swansea away) are all winnable games that I'm not really concerned about. United have to go to a Spurs team with their tails up, and a few other potential slip ups like Norwich away and they historically struggle at Ewood. Plus of course they have to come to God's own.

I'm much more worried about our run up to the United game - Norwich away and Wolves away. Games in which the opposition will be desperate for a win and we struggle against their styles of play. Maybe Wolves will change now McCarthy isn't there, but I doubt it.

The point is, although we are top of the league, we haven't played well in almost two months now and sticking all of our hopes on a returning Yaya Toure will set us up for disappointment. This will be a scrap to the finish line and we need to keep our bottle throughout.

Okay mate. I think you are over-thinking things. At first when I saw the length of this post, I thought it would be a rant of some sort. However, you do make sense in a number of your points. However, there are some fallacies to your arguments. I don't have the time at the moment to go through the in-depth with concrete example so Ill just talk about them generally.

First of all, I certainly feel that despite our record, our quality of play has fallen over the past few games since Yaya has left. As you mentioned in your post, our off the ball movement is generally poor due to the fact that we have diminutive players like silva and nasri who dont really provide that attacking drive towards goal because they can just be bodied off the ball outside the box from the bigger PL players. So they have to make use of dribbling and through-balls through the center when there is space opened up by the movement of our strikers around the box. This is why micah is so important to our way of play because he is a stocky player who can make unstoppable and dangerous runs through a wall of defenders. Our general play is always based on possession serving a defensive purpose and power and quick movements near the opposition box. The times when we have lost this season is when the likes of micah and yaya were not playing or have failed in providing that impetus through the centre.

Power through our midfield and creativity from david silva to make space for our strikers and fullbacks/wingers is exactly how we play. The limitation in our play lies in our personnel at the moment and thats why yaya back will be a tremendous boost, although as a single player, his influence on games are limited. He is also a good goalscorer and a creative force in around the box (think tottenham away). I think he also demonstrated his importance during the stoke and norwich games at home. We were so utterly dominated by our midfield and Yaya created a number of chances from making smart passes around the box and being a nuisance in the box with his big presence and threat. We have no other player to compensate for the threat that Yaya provides due to his size, strength and powerful runs. We are also missing Mario who adds to our threat in such a way with added pace and a powerful and accurate shot.

I dont blame Bobby and his general playing style at all. We won playing like this against the likes of swansea and stoke at home when they were parking the bus and even to teams like aston villa who had a real go at us when they came to the Etihad. I dont see why we cant do the same at the Britannia or at Carrow road. I am not worried in the least. You are also wrong about him playing very narrow teams as alot of his teams play with really pacy fullbacks who get passes from a deep-lying mid when counter attacking. He bases his entire gameplan on a creative and powerful midfield with pacy fullbacks providing width. The 1-6 game was an epitome of his tactic. He just doesnt do wingers but they dont reduce our attacking threat from wide areas much because he doesn't like playing the direct lumping-crosses-into-the-box style of football. This is why Dzeko doenst really prosper in our team. But he changes his team according and I think he understands that at times, a more direct approach is required and thus his lineup yesterday. The one thing I didn't agree with him was not playing Dzeko in such a lineup. But I think he thought he'd play with 1 striker and that Aguero has more of an attacking threat.

Surely Yaya is not a panacea for our problems of late. But he can surely be the catalyst to get us attacking with confidence through the middle and with the power that we showed in the beginning of the season.

 

[bluetonium]

Relax! Yaya does things naturally - be it pass, make space or change the tempo. That's what we need, just Yaya to be Yaya. That in itself creates so much room that it gives the others that bit of freedom. Just the tonic.

 

[salfordblues]

Totally agree about Yaya and said the same thing yesterday. I do think Aguero has struggled a bit recently. For some reason it's just not coming off for him. Like you say he can't be accused of not putting the effort in, I think that he's maybe due a slice of luck to rekindle his scoring form.

I think we've got a bit more mettle than the Arse team a few years ago. If you look at our players we've got a certain "Englishness" to our team with the likes of Barry Milner and Lescott. These players have a decent amount of fight and grit in them to drag us through games.

There is a lack of width in our side and Mancini to a certain extent tried to address it yesterday. However why did he do it without our most effective "wide man" Micah Richards.

When teams sit deep I believe he becomes one our most important attackers. Although it doesn't always look pretty he manages to beat a man and open a team up by getting in behind him.

I know rotation is important but yesterday was (or should have been seen) as our most important over the next few weeks and Mancini got it wrong by not starting him.

 

[Blue Tooth]

Why is that we have a selection of talent returning - Ya Ya, Balotelli and Tevez - which should have our competitors quaking on their boots. Yet I can't shake the feeling that we're going to blow it?

Maybe because you are a glass half empty kinda fella? or maybe a typical City fan ;)

My feeling yesterday when I saw the line up was that Bobby had decided we were not going to lose the game...the games away at Sunderland, West Brom and at Everton could've seen us score more goals but didn't and so maybe he is acknowledging a 'moment' when we are finding it hard to score.Over the season we are second in the away form league and first at home. We have won our last two away so perhaps we have turned a corner there.What I saw yesterday was a patient and precise build up that just lacked a quality finish and yes we have seen that a few times already these past few games. On the right wing I thought Cuellar had AJ in his pocket and so Kolarov became the only outlet. He delivered some fantastic crossed balls yesterday that lacked a finish. (Maybe Edin might've got on the end of one of those after say 60 mins) As a former striker I suspect Bobby is holding on with Sergio in the knowledge that one of the chances is gonna fly home and the floodgates will open again. I can see there being a few nailbiters between now and the end, for us and for the rags...one thing that was heartwarming yesterday was that we did not look remotely like crumbling and finally, we have the better keeper which may be the difference in the end.

 

[Andouble]

I'd love it if we 'defended our way to the title'. It winds up all the haters a hell of a lot which would make the title even more satisfying.

 

[dave_blue12]

Good original post.

My feeling is that the players mentality has gradually changed.

At the start of the season it was an all to play for/nothing to lose attitude.

But since we beat the Rags our play has become inhibited. We now have something to lose.

I find myself extremely frustrated at our incessant backward passing when there are, admittedly more risky, attacking passes on. This also has the effect of discouraging the player making the forward run as the ball is not delivered as often as it was early season.

Sadly, unless we can shake off this mindset I think that there are likely to be more Sunderland/Everton results and the PL Title will slip through our fingers.

 

[schfc6]

Very well measured and thought out post. Nothing to disagree with. I think it can be added to though.
In my opinion Ya Ya's return will have more impact than you think or are suggesting. Psychologically it will give the team and fans a lift. His name, presence and now rapidly growing reputation will always strike fear into our opponents.

I do believe that David, Aguero, Nasri and the full backs benefit from his presence in the team. With Ya Ya in the team, sitting in the middle, dominating the game it seems to have a relaxing effect on their games, and certainly Silva & Aguero play with more freedom and confidence when Ya Ya is around he is the platform for them to thrive.

Whilst we have coped admirably without him in my opinion, his return can only be a good thing. As a player he can be 3 different players all in one game. He can't be replaced only covered. He has the defensive qualities of De Jong when we need them, the ball retention abilities of Gaz Baz and the drive of Milner, he also has goals in him, which sadly his understudies do not.

Confidence in football seems to be massively important, with the return of Sir Vincent to the defence, Ya Ya in midfield and Super Mario up top we should be stronger, and what better two fixtures to get the team back to it's free flowing confident best the Bolton & Blackburn at home.