Yaya

[Shawnducati]

Lol, you sound like one of those David Silva apologists. Yaya normally doesn't get the 'Injury excuse' exception, that normally is reserved for Silva, Aguero and Kompany; You know, the Injury prone guys we bend over backwards to not call out when they perform poorly. :)

This is the first time I'm seeing Yaya in this group.

Agree with you sooooo much!!!!

Silva looks horrible and it's his ankle.

Yaya on one leg....he's lazy.

So frustrating on this board at times and turns me off.

 

[Shawnducati]

Say what you want about Yaya but we still look miles better with him in the team than without, a bit of an inconvenient truth for us at the moment.

Amen!

 

[fatbloke]

We could pick up a load of soldiers from the army for free if all our midfield needed to do was run forwards, get back, and play at a high energy.

Unfortunately football isn't as simple as that. You need players who can play too. Especially at City's level you need a central midfielder who can dictate a game, pick a pass, penetrate the oppositions midfield, find our attacking player's feet with sharp, incisive passing.

As was evidenced by the Liverpool away and Stoke away games, when Yaya isn't there, we really struggle to control the game. Fernandinho is a brilliant player, probably our playerof the season, but in terms of dictating play, he's light years behind Yaya.

If anything I'd say you're overcomplicating the game for no reason. We've played the same slow and ponderous style for the last 18 months/2 years and it's not worked, so why on earth would you continue doing the same thing game after game? Leicester and Tottenham are both currently proving there's no one style of play that's guaranteed to be successful, you don't have to try and emulate Barcelona to win games, you need all XI players playing together as a team to be greater than the sum of the individual parts.

All this bollocks about "needing a central midfielder who can dictate a game, pick a pass, penetrate the oppositions midfield, find our attacking player's feet with sharp, incisive passing" - when was the last time Yaya did that in big games consistently? You might get odd world class performances which paper over the cracks. Consistency wins you league titles, not 4 or 5 performances a season. Again look at Leicester and Spurs, who do they have that plays that role - absolutely fucking no one.

I'm not saying I want us to play like Leicester, defending like fuck and hoofing it up to Aguero, not at all but if things aren't going well then you go back to basics and they're the team that do the basics better than anyone. You defend compactly, work hard, close down quickly and do the dirty work - then the quality will shine through in the short term. Spurs are doing it the right way, they're not anywhere near as good as us technically but they're probably the closest in terms of style of play and work rate.

 

[PragueBlue]

Say what you want about Yaya but we still look miles better with him in the team than without, a bit of an inconvenient truth for us at the moment.

Exactly.

 

[Shaelumstash]

If anything I'd say you're overcomplicating the game for no reason. We've played the same slow and ponderous style for the last 18 months/2 years and it's not worked, so why on earth would you continue doing the same thing game after game? Leicester and Tottenham are both currently proving there's no one style of play that's guaranteed to be successful, you don't have to try and emulate Barcelona to win games, you need all XI players playing together as a team to be greater than the sum of the individual parts.

All this bollocks about "needing a central midfielder who can dictate a game, pick a pass, penetrate the oppositions midfield, find our attacking player's feet with sharp, incisive passing" - when was the last time Yaya did that in big games consistently? You might get odd world class performances which paper over the cracks. Consistency wins you league titles, not 4 or 5 performances a season. Again look at Leicester and Spurs, who do they have that plays that role - absolutely fucking no one.

I'm not saying I want us to play like Leicester, defending like fuck and hoofing it up to Aguero, not at all but if things aren't going well then you go back to basics and they're the team that do the basics better than anyone. You defend compactly, work hard, close down quickly and do the dirty work - then the quality will shine through in the short term. Spurs are doing it the right way, they're not anywhere near as good as us technically but they're probably the closest in terms of style of play and work rate.

Jesus I'm glad your not the manager mate! Your views on football sound similar to Stuart Pearce, get 11 grafters in, it doesn't matter if they can play football or any of that "bollocks".

I think you're going to be disappointed next season if you think having a deep lying midfielder who can dictate play and find penetrating passes is overly complicated. Guardiola's whole managerial career has been based on having players like that in his teams.

A lot is made of how hard Guardiola's teams work, and no doubt they do work very hard and cover a lot of yards. But talent, technique, intelligence comes first. His style is to take very talented footballers and organise them and make them work hard.

You won't see the opposite - him taking hard working, grafting players with little talent and trying to make them pass it better or any of that "bollocks" ;-)

 

[ono]

Do you not think some of our forward players look scared, ok maybe scared is too strong a word, maybe hesitant in possession? Always looking for the safe pass rather than expressing themselves and committing defenders.

Now, look at it from another point of view. The team is so unbalanced with Yaya in central midfield and so vulnerable to counter attacks, do you not think that hesitation or fear of losing possession stems from that lack of confidence in the rest of the teams ability to regain possession?

That's because dangerous passing angles only exist for us once the play has been stretched, like on a counter attack for example. We play possession football with the idea of overloading an area, before trying to find a key pass into a less populated area of the final third, where we might be able to get into a 1 v 1 situation, or even a clear shot on goal. To drag opposition out of position we have to make a number of simple passes which might not even end up leading to us eventually creating a chance. For this to be more effective we need players with Yaya's technique, vision and ability to retain the ball under pressure. A player can't just set out to express himself and commit defenders every time he has the ball. There needs to be a platform for him to do it, and that platform arises when said player does happen to get the ball in a dangerous area, in a 1 v1 situation.

I don't for one minute think players are scared to lose possession because Yaya is playing. I find that quite laughable. I think players in our system play patient possession based football because that's what they are supposed to do. I also don't think the likes of Fernandinho, Delph and Fernando have the ability or vision to play an expansive passing game without consistently turning over the ball.

I love how you always blame Yaya for us being vulnerable to the counter attack. He plays as the furthest forward central midfielder. The only player centrally ahead of him is Aguero. He often has Fernando and Fernandinho (who some on here argue is the best central midfielder in the league) behind him, is often flanked by one of Sterling and Navas (who are both defensively disciplined) and behind all of those players, is a back 4 and a keeper. Yet he's the one causing us to be vulnerable to the counter attack? How? Is the opposition's centre back running past him? No. Is the opposition's defensive midfielder running past him? no. Is the opposition's central midfielder running past him? Not often.

I'm sorry but those in the team to do a defensive job (and there's 6 or 7 of them) need to take their share of the blame. Maybe we are vulnerable to the counter attack because without Kompany to guide them through the game, our entire back 6 are positionally woeful when we lose the ball. Perfect recent examples would be the second Spurs goal, and the Mahrez Leicester goal where we were played through by only a couple of players. We shouldn't need 8 or 9 players back to defend either of those situations.

But yeah, blame Yaya because he looks lazy when he jogs.

 

[OB1]

That's because dangerous passing angles only exist for us once the play has been stretched, like on a counter attack for example. We play possession football with the idea of overloading an area, before trying to find a key pass into a less populated area of the final third, where we might be able to get into a 1 v 1 situation, or even a clear shot on goal. To drag opposition out of position we have to make a number of simple passes which might not even end up leading to us eventually creating a chance. For this to be more effective we need players with Yaya's technique, vision and ability to retain the ball under pressure. A player can't just set out to express himself and commit defenders every time he has the ball. There needs to be a platform for him to do it, and that platform arises when said player does happen to get the ball in a dangerous area, in a 1 v1 situation.

I don't for one minute think players are scared to lose possession because Yaya is playing. I find that quite laughable. I think players in our system play patient possession based football because that's what they are supposed to do. I also don't think the likes of Fernandinho, Delph and Fernando have the ability or vision to play an expansive passing game without consistently turning over the ball.

I love how you always blame Yaya for us being vulnerable to the counter attack. He plays as the furthest forward central midfielder. The only player centrally ahead of him is Aguero. He often has Fernando and Fernandinho (who some on here argue is the best central midfielder in the league) behind him, is often flanked by one of Sterling and Navas (who are both defensively disciplined) and behind all of those players, is a back 4 and a keeper. Yet he's the one causing us to be vulnerable to the counter attack? How? Is the opposition's centre back running past him? No. Is the opposition's defensive midfielder running past him? no. Is the opposition's central midfielder running past him? Not often.

I'm sorry but those in the team to do a defensive job (and there's 6 or 7 of them) need to take their share of the blame. Maybe we are vulnerable to the counter attack because without Kompany to guide them through the game, our entire back 6 are positionally woeful when we lose the ball. Perfect recent examples would be the second Spurs goal, and the Mahrez Leicester goal where we were played through by only a couple of players. We shouldn't need 8 or 9 players back to defend either of those situations.

But yeah, blame Yaya because he looks lazy when he jogs.

And he likes cake.

 

[fatbloke]

Jesus I'm glad your not the manager mate! Your views on football sound similar to Stuart Pearce, get 11 grafters in, it doesn't matter if they can play football or any of that "bollocks".

I think you're going to be disappointed next season if you think having a deep lying midfielder who can dictate play and find penetrating passes is overly complicated. Guardiola's whole managerial career has been based on having players like that in his teams.

A lot is made of how hard Guardiola's teams work, and no doubt they do work very hard and cover a lot of yards. But talent, technique, intelligence comes first. His style is to take very talented footballers and organise them and make them work hard.

You won't see the opposite - him taking hard working, grafting players with little talent and trying to make them pass it better or any of that "bollocks" ;-)

So you take 90% of what I said out of context, then make up some bullshit about Stuart Pearce, top it off with a failure to any questions that don't fit your argument and fuck me we have your reply. Brilliant.

 

[Shaelumstash]

So you take 90% of what I said out of context, then make up some bullshit about Stuart Pearce, top it off with a failure to any questions that don't fit your argument and fuck me we have your reply. Brilliant.

Mate, I will quote word for word what you said:
"All this bollocks about "needing a central midfielder who can dictate a game, pick a pass, penetrate the oppositions midfield, find our attacking player's feet with sharp, incisive passing" "

Nothing is out of context, that's your exact quote.

My point remains, if you think it is, to use your own phrase "bollocks" to have a central midfielder who can dictate a game, pick a pass, penetrate the oppositions midfield, find our attacking players with sharp, incisive passing, then I think you're going to be disappointed next season, because that's the exact type of attributes Guardiola looks for in a central midfielder.

If you don't believe me, read the books written about him, research his interviews where he talks about the game.

 

[HelloCity]

Yaya has played well for 2-3 months now. He's even been good in Europe this season as well. Of course he isn't going to get back to his peak level but that's more an age issues than him being 'lazy' as the haters like to tell you.