PD, i think this is a misrepresentation of the complaints being made about Toure last night- they certainly don't bear too much relation to mine. We recognise that the midfield battle was particularly tight- but of particular concern was the profound absence of energy in his re-positioning, specifcally. And when he got the ball, he was very easy to knock off it. I'm less annoyed about this than i was last night, so i can reasonably see that perhaps the chap is unaccustomed to the physicality he's experiencing (or certainly that he's not used to getting pushed about without hearing the ref's whistle). I also hear what people are saying about him not being fit- he doesnt look a fat bastard to me, but he does look like he's blowing out of arse, often.
As I see it- if he's inexperienced, play him, I'll look the other way while he settles into it, as I consider myself to understand reasoning, generally. If he's unfit... he's got to work on that on The Hill at Carrington, and be reintrintroduced appropriately- not used as an automatic starter.
About the diagram, I see 3 v 3 there and I'd suggest that Yaya should have been much livelier than he was in tracking the work of Scholes. It was often De jong that picked him up, because United were much more fluid and he broke forward through the other two a few times. As in any team work scenario, you need our three guys to look out for each other and take a sensible postion against the spare man- NOT slowly amble back to the general location of play from wherever you just got caught in posession.
United did play relatively narrow to congest that area of the pitch, but City could match them with two more industrious players in Spanish Dave and Milner. I'd propose that Yaya needs to come out of the team, Milner should move central and the unoccupied right side spot needs to go back to Johnno.
Still, chin up, all.
