Man City post Match thread

[Vardinio'sCat]

 

I also thought Brendan was too late with the subs.

 

And he should have got on the pitch and nutted Pep, for feeling up our lads at the end.

[StriderHiryu]

https://www.lcfc.com/news/1211862/im-proud-of-the-team-says-rodgers

 

Good read this and it gives a good explanation of what we were trying to do and what went wrong. He mentions our ability to play out of Man City’s high press which for me was easily the most impressive part of our performance tonight. We did go back to Kasper a bit much for my liking but to see such a young team deal with that pressure was extremely pleasing. In the first half Vardy was excellent at linking the play and keeping the move going. 

 

Rodgers does mention the second half where for the first twenty we couldn’t live with them. It was a fantastic goal they scored from an unlikely source but the issue was more we couldn’t develop any of our own play whereas we did so in the first. 

 

Still if you were in Rodgers’ shoes I think you’d be pleased with what you’d seen tonight. With your own signings and a full summer preseason to come you’d probably be optimistic in terms of what the team can achieve. 

[the fox]

It's always underwhelming when the team losses because of a relatively late goal but that shouldn't mean that the result is overshadowing the great potential the squad has. Just hope Vards can keep it going and produce 15-20 goals a year in the next 2 seasons.

[treer]

Sometimes you just got to take your hat off to an opposing player.

Vincent Kompany, I hated you a couple of seasons ago when you cynicaly stopped Vardy going through on goal in the first 5 minutes, and escaped a sending off.

But my God what a goal, and what a captain you are.

[foxinsox]

1 hour ago, Chrysalis said:

First half we reverted to puel tactics, which wasnt necessarily terrible but I felt we too often passed it back to kasper when we were in their third.

 

Second half I dont know what I was watching, we suddenly were playing like a relegation team who is fighting for a draw, and just hoofing it out on every clearance, a strategy that never works.  The exception was maguire running out which gave us a bout 5 mins of breathing space and other opportunities to get it forward, but then we started hoofing again before the eventual goal.  It was like watching craig shakespeare's team again, hooooof.

 

Rodgers needs to fix these issues, I dont want another performance like that second half again, always always either pass or dribble the ball out, when there is space.

 

Tielemans had a poor game, vardy didnt close down players, iheanacho was iheanacho.

While there is much here that I agree with, second half wasn't Shakespeare bad. Guardiola did a much better half time talk, and Man City had a couple of decent chances before Kompanys goal, and after that they played with us. 

 

Initiale Sane was a real threat, then Ricardo nullified them, but ee never looked like pushing forward. 

 

Nachos miss was shocking, but he has had hardly any recent game time so not entirely surprising that he is rusty. Nonetheless it has not worked for him at Leicester and he needs to move on. 

 

Many good performances against the best team that money could buy, but ultimately a loss is a loss and we need to improve.

 

They nullified our creative players well, particularly Tielemans and Vardy, but excellent performances in large part otherwise. Ricardo, Ndidi and Choudhary particularly stood out for me. 

 

The absence of set pieces for us is something we need to work on. They are the means to nick a goal against teams like this, or teams that park the bus. 

[Gamble92]

Really proud of the performance and the signs are very promising for the future. 

 

But what i didnt understand is our tactics second half. We were playing for a draw and from our own point of view we needed a win. Seemed like we were more bothered about the title race than our own predicament. 

[Clarkey123]

Tough one to swallow, wasn’t even worried when Kompany lined up that shot but that’s why they’re champions, thought we were gona be the side to hand it to Liverpool tonight. Maddison looked quality on the ball again, world class composure to make a yard for himself, unfortunate we couldn’t get him on the ball enough tonight. Looking forward to seeing the back of iheanacho although can’t blame him for taking the snapshot when he’s desperate for a goal, he needs a year out on loan to ever stand a chance of gaining any form. Maguire was superb, has a real class about him on the ball and going forward, desperately need to keep hold of him for next season. Futures looking bright with Brendan

[deanolegend1989]

I think we played brilliantly for the first 20 mins but never really a sniff afterwards. You can’t sit deep from 25/30 mins and expect to get a point. The players were nakard by 60-65 and it’s inevitable we wernt going to last if we’re so deep.

The thing is, the best way to defend is to attack and make them bring men back. Also chasing and concentration levels to defend for 90 mins is tiring, the legs and minds get tired. Best form of defence is to attack.

Im a bit frustrated because we struggled from 30-45 and got in at 0-0 at Ht and I think the longer it went on in the 2nd half it was going to come eventually.

i think around 60-65 when it was clear we were too deep, Brendan should of changed tactics and actually pushed higher up.

People would say ‘we would get hammered 2/3-0 if we go for it’ but We would have more chance than doing what Burnley did the week before and trying to hold out. Just felt like we were always losing playing that way. It was coming from 45-55...still 55-65 and this is when Brendan should use the subs and push out. Everytime we got a sniff in their half we caused problems. We have more forward talent than Burnley and currently Man Utd and feel our best chance to cause upset is throw fire with fire around 60-70 and if we managed to knick the first goal could lock up the parked bus after.

 

Anyway all in all though, we were playing one of the best teams to ever play in PL, and we were in a game right till the final whistle, whilst they were wasting time and sticking it in the corner. so a good effort from our boys.

 

Choudry was fantastic, Maddison is a talent on the ball and we worked brilliantly as a team at times. In particular though, special mention to me for Ricardo, he is an absolutely outstanding wingback. We must keep him!

[NaijaFox]

3 hours ago, Trav Le Bleu said:

In fairness, I think if it was someone like Aguerro or Sterling on the ball, they'd have closed him down.

 

To a worldie to beat us though.

Spot on! I was thinking leave him alone it will end up in Row Z... 

[Deeg67]

I'm sure this has been mentioned somewhere already, but why in the world did Rodgers sub off Tielemans and Maddison - the two guys who can create a goal out of nothing - and leave guys like Albrighton, Choudhury and Ndidi on the pitch?  Seemed like extremely odd moves given we were chasing 2 goals to have any chance at 7th.

[NaijaFox]

3 hours ago, SouthStandUpperTier said:

We aren't. We aren't at all.

But we are.

 

Under Puel we did it habitually, now we almost always only do it to retain possession.

[NaijaFox]

3 hours ago, wokinghamfox said:

We had 3 players in front of him, Hamza, Harry and Wilf. One should've have closed the space leaving two plus the full backs to nulify anything else. 

I think it's likely they may have wanted him to try a 30+ yarder. I know I did... 

[volpeazzurro]

1 hour ago, Deeg67 said:

I'm sure this has been mentioned somewhere already, but why in the world did Rodgers sub off Tielemans and Maddison - the two guys who can create a goal out of nothing - and leave guys like Albrighton, Choudhury and Ndidi on the pitch?  Seemed like extremely odd moves given we were chasing 2 goals to have any chance at 7th.

Quite simply neither of them were contributing anymore and that not a criticism,  they'd both run their nuts off and were knackered.

[Deeg67]

Yeah, I don’t buy that. Ndidi and Albrighton were just as tired.

[Dave Fishwick]

Not sure what the gameplan was but was disappointed in Vardy tonight. Rarely saw him hassling defenders and we basically gave them free reign to play out from the back, we let them out so easy and just dropped off.

 

We also didn't play to his strengths either, I was desperate for us to try and get him 1v1 with Kompany, little balls into the channels but for the life of me I can't remember one instance. 

 

Anyway other than that lots of positives. Choudhury looked to be everywhere, there was 3 of him, he's growing with every match. 

 

Didn't enjoy seeing Kompany go up to Pep after the game though and basically tell him to sign Tielemans though

[Tom12345]

Nacho should have let the ball run to his right foot before striking it with that right foot. The keeper had the left covered and so the only way around the keeper was out of bounds - exactly as he did. Should have been more aware where the goal was. Vardy would not have missed.

[Biggus]

Iheanacho the only player where Class is temporary and Form is permanent.

[KingsX]

1 hour ago, deanolegend1989 said:

I think we played brilliantly for the first 20 mins but never really a sniff afterwards. You can’t sit deep from 25/30 mins and expect to get a point. The players were nakard by 60-65 and it’s inevitable we wernt going to last if we’re so deep.

The thing is, the best way to defend is to attack and make them bring men back. Also chasing and concentration levels to defend for 90 mins is tiring, the legs and minds get tired.

 

IMO we were not overly defensive.  We had the lesser forces, and were wise not to expose our throat.  We just aren’t ready yet.  Trying to dictate terms to that monolith is a huge ask, especially for an inexperienced side.

 

My take: Tonight was a cauldron for our young guys.  Just holding and advancing possession took constant effort both on and off the ball.  We were their equals for 45’.  We hit some mental fatigue, were ground down and forced back toward the bunker.  We fought on, we were not routed, but Man City were unrelenting and took away our threat.

 

It was a good lesson for a team that is further up the technical  learning curve, than the experiential one.  An encounter with what “consistency” means at the highest level.

 

Our group might well benefit from another Huth-type leader.

 

[KingKoala]

I was moved by the post match interview from Kompany saying they were playing against top 6 club..

[Happy Fox]

Manchester City fans perspective nice to see.

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Brendan Rodgers left Celtic on a treble to manage Leicester and how he’s turned them around. Top manager. Credit to him. Expect Leicester to be a team next season #lcfc #mcfc

[Tom12345]

1 hour ago, KingsX said:

 

IMO we were not overly defensive.  We had the lesser forces, and were wise not to expose our throat.  We just aren’t ready yet.  Trying to dictate terms to that monolith is a huge ask, especially for an inexperienced side.

 

My take: Tonight was a cauldron for our young guys.  Just holding and advancing possession took constant effort both on and off the ball.  We were their equals for 45’.  We hit some mental fatigue, were ground down and forced back toward the bunker.  We fought on, we were not routed, but Man City were unrelenting and took away our threat.

 

It was a good lesson for a team that is further up the technical  learning curve, than the experiential one.  An encounter with what “consistency” means at the highest level.

 

Our group might well benefit from another Huth-type leader.

 

Indeed it was a good lesson for the team. I think the players did well, but hats off to Guadiola, his tactics were far superior compared to Rogers’. He saw that we wanted to play from the back and were using Schmichel a lot, but Schmichel was a weakness and Ndidi and Hamza were not good enough to rescue the back four with good positioning to receive a pass and go forward. When pressured, he saw that Ndidi and Hamza would pass backwards and ultimately to Schmichel who had no choice but to pump it upfield. I mean, if we have to just pump it upfield, I rather Albrighton do this (or indeed any other player but Kasper). As a result, Guadiola pushed his team higher and higher up the pitch because he knew that 95% of the time we would pass backwards and the risk of a counter was negligible. This constant press high up field meant that we were not able to even get past our own half.  Rogers should have dealt with this by changing tactics as I said during the game - including to drop Maddison deeper to help rescue the back four but also to have more forwards upfield so Guadiola could not press as high to reduce risk of a counter.

 

Outplayed on tactics. Guadiola 1 - Rogers 0

 

 

[Livid]

We probably deserved a point.

 

We were solid, Kasper had about two or three saves all night. 

 

I don't blame us standing off against Kompany honestly how many times do Centre Backs hit a shot as well as that. Great goal.

 

Iheanacho's chance falls to Vardy and we get our point.....Probably!

[CosbehFox]

Some folk he mistranslating passing the ball backwards as being defensive. It was a tactic to beat Man City’s press, which worked for 25 minutes. We didn’t shirk from that for the rest of the first half. 

 

No doubt we lost that freshness on the ball second half  

[mozartfox]

Just woke up - have I missed any tweets from Chris Sutton?

[ARTY_FOX]

Bit harsh to lay the blame solely on Iheanacho.