EDS/Academy Games

[iwasthere2012]

What a weird game that was, I can't even believe how biased the commentators were and that ref lost the plot, along with a couple of city players

Should be used to it by now, but when even our youth teams can't be given a fair commentary it starts to get really tiresome.
Who were these two clowns. It's just really annoying that every time you watch City on TV, you have to put up with that kind of crap.

[Ted Hughes]

Byrne lost it completely and needs to sort his head out. I dont know what he was crying about. It was a poor challenge and he only has himself to blame.

I tecon it's down to being constantly fouled but constantly penalised.

There was a big foul on Nemane just prior to it but he ends up giving a free kick away trying to fight it off, then Byrne gets sent off a few secs later.

And what was his first yellow for. It was poor by the ref but he shouldn't have reacted like he did.
I thought overall we were poor and very slow in the build up. Sloppy passing all around. We got on top of it in the second half until Bryan got sent off. He was caught in possession too many times. Thought Byrne was getting well into the game up until he got sent off.
Nemane did alright but not much for him to aim for.
I know you guys see a lot more of them than I do, but that to me was all to familiar. It was like watching the 1st team and having the same horrible inevitable feeling about what the outcome would be.
It's a recurring theme, City being screwed over in Europe.

Barca, Real Madrid etc often lose to shit like that.

If these same teams around Europe played each other every year in the same competition, City would win it sometimes. But no chance they would win it every year. You can either play football or you can play that busparking shit they played or Chelsea & Atletico played last week.

Both kinds of team win European competitions.

[Ted Hughes]

Just as a general rule, I think the younger players are likely to be better than the likes of Byrne, Pozo, & possibly Ntcham.

Pozo is being outgrown, lierally even, & it's starting to look as if he will not live up to his fantastic potential. I haven't written him off, as there were little flashes tonight & he is awesomely talented, but it is looking a bit of a concern.

We will know next season I think. If it's going to happen for him, he will come alive then.

[iwasthere2012]

Byrne lost it completely and needs to sort his head out. I dont know what he was crying about. It was a poor challenge and he only has himself to blame.

I tecon it's down to being constantly fouled but constantly penalised.

There was a big foul on Nemane just prior to it but he ends up giving a free kick away trying to fight it off, then Byrne gets sent off a few secs later.

And what was his first yellow for. It was poor by the ref but he shouldn't have reacted like he did.
I thought overall we were poor and very slow in the build up. Sloppy passing all around. We got on top of it in the second half until Bryan got sent off. He was caught in possession too many times. Thought Byrne was getting well into the game up until he got sent off.
Nemane did alright but not much for him to aim for.
I know you guys see a lot more of them than I do, but that to me was all to familiar. It was like watching the 1st team and having the same horrible inevitable feeling about what the outcome would be.
It's a recurring theme, City being screwed over in Europe.

Barca, Real Madrid etc often lose to shit like that.

If these same teams around Europe played each other every year in the same competition, City would win it sometimes. But no chance they would win it every year. You can either play football or you can play that busparking shit they played or Chelsea & Atletico played last week.

Both kinds of team win European competitions.

I hear what your saying Ted. To me the most disappointing thing about that game was the cynicism. I praised the U18 games the other week for the honesty and speed. This was not the same. Cynicism and play acting from the first half on. Not as bad as the Prem or Champs Leagues but you could see that's the standard they are aiming for.
I'd rather see them play football honestly and lose at this level.

[twosips]

Didn't watch it but reading the thoughts back basically sums up exactly how i thought the game would go when i saw the lineup.

Maffeo, a RB, should have been at RB.
Humphreys, A CB, should have been at CB.
Pozo should have maybe been Left of the 3, with Ambrose up top and Nemane out on the right.

Celina is not a wide player. Both him and Boadu are better than Ntcham and Byrne.

Several players not in their best position immediately isn't a good thing.

Even before the game kicked off you could see we were missing two things from the u18 team games - 1) natural chemistry. I.e - Angelino and Barker down the left. Tosin and Humphreys alongside each other at CB. Maffeo and Nemane down the right. Boadu and Celina ahead of Bryan. None of these things existed today and secondly 2) Pace. Boadu, Barker and Nemane all offer forward bursts. Even Celina skips pasts challenges more than Byrne does. Without that dynamism our possession football ends up a little toothless and i thought that'd be the case with this team.


As others have said, our younger players are better, which is a good thing obviously cos they're the more obvious fruits of our coaching labour and its an encouraging thing. I don't think Ntcham or Pozo will make with us personally, but we'll see.

These things happen. The only thing that annoys me is the players being played out of position as thats making your own problems and doesn't make any sense.

[stevefromdonny]

I watched the game and it looked like it was the first team with the passing along the halfway line, but we did have some pace

[kinkylola]

sounds like the occasion might have gotten to them a bit, it happens.

We'll see who emerges from this with their heads up and the hunger to improve, good test.

[Goaters 103]

Cannot believe how biased and anti-City the commentary was. Where those guys borrowed from mutv ffs? They couldn't say one positive thing about us, and to slag off Vieira for his "conduct" and it effecting our players was laughable.

Anyone who doesn't believe there's a genuine anti-City bias should've listened to that game from the start; it was painful.

As for the lads - poor performance. Not sure why Maffeo didn't play right back but then Vieiras forgotten more about the game than I know, so Id trust his judgement over mine. Think I jinxed Kean Bryan singing his praises last week on here.

What I would say is that Id rather go out of that comp trying to play footy the way we did, than go through with all the historyonics and shite Roma displayed. There 2nd goal was a corker of a shot but that's a side we shoulve beaten in our sleep if we were on our game.

[Ted Hughes]

Cannot believe how biased and anti-City the commentary was. Where those guys borrowed from mutv ffs? They couldn't say one positive thing about us, and to slag off Vieira for his "conduct" and it effecting our players was laughable.

Anyone who doesn't believe there's a genuine anti-City bias should've listened to that game from the start; it was painful.

As for the lads - poor performance. Not sure why Maffeo didn't play right back but then Vieiras forgotten more about the game than I know, so Id trust his judgement over mine. Think I jinxed Kean Bryan singing his praises last week on here.

What I would say is that Id rather go out of that comp trying to play footy the way we did, than go through with all the historyonics and shite Roma displayed. There 2nd goal was a corker of a shot but that's a side we shoulve beaten in our sleep if we were on our game.

Roma are one of the best sides in the competition as regards difficult to play against & City did well to beat them twice previously & should have again.

We weren't at our best but it was a very difficult game on a pitch not suited to our kind of football, & we still almost got a result with 9 men.

Chelsea should beat them on a neutral ground, but I wouldn't back them to have done it yesterday, especially not with that ref, who would not have allowed Chelsea to play 90% of their usual game.

[Wonderwall]

probably gone unnoticed in the malaise but

Congratulations to
Angus Gunn
Brandon Barker
Kean Bryan
Ashley Smith-Brown

on their u19 england call ups.

[gmercer1]

probably gone unnoticed in the malaise but

Congratulations to
Angus Gunn
Brandon Barker
Kean Bryan
Ashley Smith-Brown

on their u19 england call ups.

Not forgetting Chris Smalling and Phil Jones for their call up to the full squad!!!!!!!!!!!!! WTF is going on!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Douglas Higginbottom]

18's saturday morning followed by a win against WBA sounds like good days football to me.

[Hutch's Shoulder]

probably gone unnoticed in the malaise but

Congratulations to
Angus Gunn
Brandon Barker
Kean Bryan
Ashley Smith-Brown

on their u19 england call ups.

That's us, ruining English football.

[Beefymcfc]

18's saturday morning followed by a win against WBA sounds like good days football to me.

I'm really missing it all being away. I'd be making a day of this. EDS, followed by the game and then onto the Stella.

What more can a man ask for!

[twosips]

Dead excited for this. Hoping its a pretty strong u18s. Dunno if plenty of em will be rested though cos of the midweek game.

I'm expecting the likes of Buckley, Haug, Tattum, Fernandes, Garcia, Smith-Brown, Wood etc... maybe Celina and Boadu. I can't imagine Barker, Angelino, Maffeo etc will play after that midweek game. Who knows though?

[Douglas Higginbottom]

Dead excited for this. Hoping its a pretty strong u18s. Dunno if plenty of em will be rested though cos of the midweek game.

I'm expecting the likes of Buckley, Haug, Tattum, Fernandes, Garcia, Smith-Brown, Wood etc... maybe Celina and Boadu. I can't imagine Barker, Angelino, Maffeo etc will play after that midweek game. Who knows though?

I think your assessment of the likely team is spot on maybe without Smith Brown.The last 18's league team was :
Albinson,Tattum,Vasi,Humphreys,Oliver
Wood,Diallo,Fernandes,Garcia
Nemane ,Buckley and with Bullock,Kongolo,Celina and Faour on the bench.

[Dameerto]

Less than ten minutes to go for the U18's and they've let a 3-1 lead slip by conceding 2 goals in eight minutes to make it 3-3.

[Douglas Higginbottom]

Less than ten minutes to go for the U18's and they've let a 3-1 lead slip by conceding 2 goals in eight minutes to make it 3-3.

Hell maybe some of you don't actually know that WBA scored again in the 4th minute of injury time to beat us 4.3!!! So that's 3.1 up with about 15 minutes to go and we lost.

Silly silly game.It started slowly with us having the ball and doing not much and WBA happy to get 10 or 11 behind the ball.Then we started to play and created a few things before Vasi the left back was fouled and we got a pen. maybe a dodgy one but 6 goons who came in late decided at the wrong moment to push along my row and I missed it.We were miles the better side and apart from one decent attack our keeper wasn't involved for ages.

Then early 2nd half they got a free kick which the keeper came for and got nowhere near and then watched a nothing header bounce into the net. We scored with a shocking keeper error at the other end and then a 3rd from Fernandez. This was a gem as he ran across from the right side, took a great pass from Wood on his chest and smashed the ball under the keeper after it bounced once.From there it should have been a win but Boadu got injured and although I haven't mentioned his name by now he was the star player on the pitch for me.

He got no protection from the ref was was a joke but he was the one who moved forward with the ball with his great feet and ability to turn defenders and good pace too.He commits players and can dribble and is a very talented lad. Whether him going off was a real reason we conceded 3 goals I doubt it but it happened.

WBA were actually a decent attacking side when they had a go and it showed up our defensive weaknesses. Like the first team we had a few today who were not really very helpful in team defending. The striker Buckley ( who played well) did some good defending from the front but obviously when the real defending was needed. It was the same also with Garcia and Fernandez and most of the time with Dilrosun so we defended with about 6 defenders.That might not be so bad if they defended well but they didn't when under pressure.

Humphreys is ok at centre back but he isn;t that tall and can be beaten in the air but as I have said before he isn't a full back.When he gets out in wide positions he is easily beaten and was again today. Similarly Charlie Oliver the other center back and from one cross that was too easily made they scored their second.The 3rd came when a guy was allowed an easy 20 yard shot.It hit the bar but was headed home by their full back.Their center back scored the 2nd.

God knows what happened on their winner but suffice to say we were defending desperately and just seemed to be outnumbered which is a little wrong.

So not a great day for the 18's.Quite good for Fernandez who scored 2 and looks a tricky customer and he is either 16 or just 17 but a slip of a lad.Boadu as I said was quality, Wood had some good moments but some mares as well. Dilrosun was supposed to be sub but I think Nemane dropped out during the warm up. Shame that as I like Nemane and I think Dilrosun is very very average.I thought he was below average today.

[twosips]

http://www.theguardian.com/football/201 ... final-hull?

I found this interesting.... mourinho admitting basically that he's unlikely to use youth team players through fear of being sacked, essentially. We know it happens, and we'd guess its why Pellers has not given anyone a proper chance yet, but to actually hear it confirmed is rare. I worry that this is the case for Pellers too and i don't see why he'd suddenly change that next season in the last year of his contract when he's managing with his reputation on the line.

[Mikhail Chigorin]

http://www.theguardian.com/football/2015/mar/21/jose-mourinho-chelsea-youth-fa-cup-final-hull?

I found this interesting.... mourinho admitting basically that he's unlikely to use youth team players through fear of being sacked, essentially. We know it happens, and we'd guess its why Pellers has not given anyone a proper chance yet, but to actually hear it confirmed is rare. I worry that this is the case for Pellers too and i don't see why he'd suddenly change that next season in the last year of his contract when he's managing with his reputation on the line.

Interesting article and thanks for posting it.

I would hope that the avowed intention of our owners, to bring youngsters through to the first team, as exemplified by the money spent on the Academy and new training complexes, is fully honoured and I feel it will be. I just wish it would come a lot sooner than appears at the present.

However, I do feel this intention is at variance with the Chelsea example, where the suspicion exists that that their processes seem to be more geared to profit related results in the youth field.

One quote from the article which I found puzzling is where Mourinho said "It is a Club where it is not easy to play football." What the deuce does he mean by this, or is he making a veiled 'excuse' for the largely turgid fare they largely manage to serve up on matchdays ??

I thought that Abramovitch wanted his teams to play with flair, so why is Mourinho saying this and disguising it in such an article ??

Or is he simply saying he doesn't have the ability and knowledge of assembling classy teams which play with verve and style ??