Man City (H) - Pre-match Thread

[justfoxes]

woke up this morning thinking yeah I think we’ve turned a corner think we might be getting back to how we can play, then thought oh Shit we’ve got Manc City Saturday with that bloody alien 👽👽not human scoring for fun extra terrestrial 👽👽👾👾Haarland playing for them, then thought stick Wout on him put him in Wouts pocket 😉 don’t give him any space yeah we’ve got this one in the bag we'll hold them to a 0-0 or we might just knock a win who knows ?
After falling asleep again woke up in a cold sweat thought “OH SHIT MANC CITY BLOODY HELL  👽 ALIEN BLOODY 

👽HAARLAND WE’RE DOOMED !!” 

[Onions]

4-0 Vardy Hattrick, Dias sent off early on. Pep in tears. 
 

That’s only HT too. 

[Fox92]

Start Vardy. He always seems to get at these.

 

Won't happen but would be lovely to just rough them up all game. Get into the lot of them but especially De Brunye and Rhodri who will just start crying any time we go near them. Someone leave one on Haaland early in the game.

[HighPeakFox]

10 minutes ago, justfoxes said:

woke up this morning thinking yeah I think we’ve turned a corner think we might be getting back to how we can play, then thought oh Shit we’ve got Manc City Saturday with that bloody alien 👽👽not human scoring for fun extra terrestrial 👽👽👾👾Haarland playing for them, then thought stick Wout on him put him in Wouts pocket 😉 don’t give him any space yeah we’ve got this one in the bag we'll hold them to a 0-0 or we might just knock a win who knows ?
After falling asleep again woke up in a cold sweat thought “OH SHIT MANC CITY BLOODY HELL  👽 ALIEN BLOODY 

👽HAARLAND WE’RE DOOMED !!” 

What substances are still in your bloodstream from yesterday?

[Foxes96]

Tricky game for Man City away in Dortmund Tues night, before a midday KO away at Citeh. 
 

Think Rodgers might stick with the same team to keep it tight and change at 60 mins again with a triple sub.

 

                            Ward

Castagne - Amartey - Faes - Justin

     Tielemans - Soumaré - KDH

   Maddison   -   Daka   -   Barnes 

 

Subs: Vardy / Praet / Mendy @ 60 mins. 
 

Also hopefully have Wilf and Evans on the bench as well if needed 

[tickler28]

Free throw of the dice this one...just go for it....don't sit back and defend deep (suicide) if it ends 4 nil Man City no one's gonna complain so long as we give it a go

[filbertway]

Imagine we'll see the beloved back 5 for this one.

 

If he plays the same system with Madders on the right then god help the poor lads in defence

 

 

Ward

 

Castagne

Amartey

Evans

Faes

Justin

 

Tielemans

Soumare/Mendy

KDH

 

Maddison

 

Daka

[The Guvnor]

Will be interesting to see BR approach for this one. Surely it will be a defensive rather than a offensive one and hope for an opportunity to catch them on the break. He definitely won’t want anything to happen that’s going to knock their confidence.

 

 

[filbertway]

1 minute ago, The Guvnor said:

Will be interesting to see BR approach for this one. Surely it will be a defensive rather than a offensive one and hope for an opportunity to catch them on the break. He definitely won’t want anything to happen that’s going to knock their confidence.

 

 

Considering we've sat in rather deep against Leeds and Wolves, I'm wondering how much deeper we can drop. Probably all players within 25 yards of our goal for a good portion of the game

[kingkisnorbo]

Not chance we get anything. Pretty much a free hit anyway. 

[kyleolly]

1 hour ago, justfoxes said:

woke up this morning thinking yeah I think we’ve turned a corner think we might be getting back to how we can play, then thought oh Shit we’ve got Manc City Saturday with that bloody alien 👽👽not human scoring for fun extra terrestrial 👽👽👾👾Haarland playing for them, then thought stick Wout on him put him in Wouts pocket 😉 don’t give him any space yeah we’ve got this one in the bag we'll hold them to a 0-0 or we might just knock a win who knows ?
After falling asleep again woke up in a cold sweat thought “OH SHIT MANC CITY BLOODY HELL  👽 ALIEN BLOODY 

👽HAARLAND WE’RE DOOMED !!” 

Step away from the crack pipe

[st albans fox]

Pretty sure vardy starts this one

 

this is the one game vestergaard played well in last season 

perhaps we will see him chosen to play against Haarland - even though he is soft as and cannot jump !

i recall cags played well against him for turkey last year aswell 

 

agree we I’ll see a back five for this although I thought that home too liverpool last Xmas and we played a 4 

[filbertway]

2 minutes ago, st albans fox said:

Pretty sure vardy starts this one

 

this is the one game vestergaard played well in last season 

perhaps we will see him chosen to play against Haarland - even though he is soft as and cannot jump !

i recall cags played well against him for turkey last year aswell 

 

agree we I’ll see a back five for this although I thought that home too liverpool last Xmas and we played a 4 

I could potentially see a 4 4 1 1 with Praet on the right and Maddison in behind Daka or Vardy.

 

A back 4 with Maddison on the right is asking for trouble though. 

[FosseSpark]

If we play as open as we did at Wolves and v Leeds we are in deepest, darkest doo-doo at the weekend. We basically treated those games as all in scraps, relying on our greater striking ability in both those games, and it worked, but it won't vs Man City.

On reflection - with everyone fit id start the below. We can't pretend we are going to hold the at bay with 4231 i'm afraid - we just don't have the closing down pace and need to crowd Haaland whilst closing the spaces up for Grealish, Mahrez, Silva, Foden, KDB to play their triangles.

Vardy and Iheanacho give us more 'stick' up top to bring in forward players and we can switch up to pure play on the break later in the game.

I've been thinking for a while that KDH would work as a wing back in a back 5 for games like this. His energy up and down with quality on the ball and decent tackling is just what's needed and he plays virtually that wide when we play a 4 anyway.

 

Ward

Amartey Faes Evans 

Justin Tielemans Soumare KDH

Maddison

Vardy Iheanacho

 

I would save Barnes, Daka, Ndidi, Castagne and Praet for when we are hopefully still in the game in the second half and need to sit deep and play on the break.

Edited 24 October 2022 by FosseSpark

[Sunbury Fox]

Barnes has to start this. His pace in behind will be crucial, expecially as they don't have Walker available. 

[Sunbury Fox]

Could we swap Maddison and KDH so that Maddison is in the centre and KDH plays wide right? Not sure there is much point having KDH pressing their CBs as normal as they are so slick playing out. Better to have Maddison there threading passes and shooting from a central positron. KdH's energy and pressing can then be used to help stop Cancelo getting forward - he is crucial to starting their attacks and helps them to create overloads down their left.

[eddylcfc]

Vardy HAS to start given his record against Pep’s Man City.

[alanf0x]

40 minutes ago, st albans fox said:

Pretty sure vardy starts this one

 

this is the one game vestergaard played well in last season 

perhaps we will see him chosen to play against Haarland - even though he is soft as and cannot jump !

i recall cags played well against him for turkey last year aswell 

 

agree we I’ll see a back five for this although I thought that home too liverpool last Xmas and we played a 4 

Trying to work out if this is a serious message or not?!  

[J. James]

17 hours ago, Iran said:

I am afraid of Haaland. 

Possibly because you're not an insane person. 😐

[FoyleFox]

3 hours ago, justfoxes said:

woke up this morning thinking yeah I think we’ve turned a corner think we might be getting back to how we can play, then thought oh Shit we’ve got Manc City Saturday with that bloody alien 👽👽not human scoring for fun extra terrestrial 👽👽👾👾Haarland playing for them, then thought stick Wout on him put him in Wouts pocket 😉 don’t give him any space yeah we’ve got this one in the bag we'll hold them to a 0-0 or we might just knock a win who knows ?
After falling asleep again woke up in a cold sweat thought “OH SHIT MANC CITY BLOODY HELL  👽 ALIEN BLOODY 

👽HAARLAND WE’RE DOOMED !!” 

Someone's opened the Christmas sherry early

[PhillippaT]

Time to triple-captain Haarland then...  Just to be sure  

[FoyleFox]

1 hour ago, st albans fox said:

Pretty sure vardy starts this one

 

this is the one game vestergaard played well in last season 

perhaps we will see him chosen to play against Haarland - even though he is soft as and cannot jump !

i recall cags played well against him for turkey last year aswell 

 

agree we I’ll see a back five for this although I thought that home too liverpool last Xmas and we played a 4 

Vestergaard has just failed miserably to combat Fulham's U21's to the tune of 0-7, I don't think he's the man for this job.

[J. James]

48 minutes ago, Sunbury Fox said:

Could we swap Maddison and KDH so that Maddison is in the centre and KDH plays wide right? Not sure there is much point having KDH pressing their CBs as normal as they are so slick playing out. Better to have Maddison there threading passes and shooting from a central positron. KdH's energy and pressing can then be used to help stop Cancelo getting forward - he is crucial to starting their attacks and helps them to create overloads down their left.

I agree, l was slightly surprised that Rodgers didn't play Praet on the right (only slightly) but when he came on l thought it really freed Maddson up and we looked more balanced.

PS.

I suspect you may be a physicist or physician as your predictive text selects "positron" over "position"! 🤣

[Foxes1]

1 hour ago, kingkisnorbo said:

Not chance we get anything. Pretty much a free hit anyway. 

Forest said that against Liverpool and look what happened there.

[fox_up_north]

Play like Bielsa's suicidal Leeds. Everyone wins.

We're entertained, Pep will praise us for playing "proper football" and Brendan will have that pat on the back he desperately craves.