Seven and a half mins.

[Beefymcfc]

I've tried to stay away since the game because I have certain thoughts on the game and the team in particular. Firstly I will say that I don't blame the manager or players, although they are attributable. What I would say is that they have all been let down by the board, and this is why.

Have you noticed how we get to these big televised games we always go back to our 4-4-2 (or equivalent)? It's as if we are trying to put a philosophy across rather than actual tactics; this is the City way, you could say. Also, have you noticed that more times than not these tactics don't work, especially this season?

The games against Barca & Liverpool had very similar feelings, the chance we could do something until the opposition decided to turn it on, which they did. And that's where this 7 & half minutes gumf really falls down for me, and here's why.

Why are we expecting this team to give it balls-out for any longer than 7 & half minutes?

Some people will look at our team, with it's class, and think we can press the oppo all the game, forcing them into mistakes and playing in their final 3rd. Well, here's the problem and something that the board should understand. A team like Barca could do this because they were brought up that way, or a team like Liverpool have the players to keep up the tempo, we DON'T. The whole point in pressing is that the whole team can do it, or at least in each dept, especially the midfield. We DON'T have those players.

Just look at the stats from Sunday's game. Liverpool's average age was 24 years old, a FULL 4 years younger than ours. And individual units, what were their stats? Apart from the keeper, who are similar, they were younger and more mobile in all depts, and that wasn't just stats, it showed. In defence they averaged 25 years old to our 28, in midfield they were 25 to our 29 and in attack they were 21 to our 27. Even from the bench, with Kolo coming on, they averaged 29 to our 30 (Lampard killed it at 36). With those stats is it any wonder we can't keep up the pace?

So, going back to the original 'I don't blame the manager or players, although they are attributable', these are my thoughts. The manager does take the can by and large but in this instance, and as we play this 'philosophy', it is a practice that is engrained through the club, one in which we will grow our brand on. The philosophy is that you have the players to win the game, regardless of how you defend - it's all about how many you score. Pellegrini is told how to play unless he has a player shortage and actually has a say on how we should do things and implement a pragmatic view and use tactics, as we seen when we had all our strikers out.

The players themselves don't buy into the philosophy, basically because they play the actual game and they know their limits. We've seen numerous changes to the team each match day and the dynamic you try not to change is the back 4, but we see it time and time again as Pellers tries to keep them fresh. We've been seriously let down at the back and near enough every one of them are shot, not being able to make the basic decision of 'Should I come or Should I hold', whic states to me that they've been told how to play, by getting a foot in or sticking close. How the hell can a 13 stone 28 year old do this against a 20 year old matchstick, you can never win!

But where does any blame lie then, the manager, the players, the board? Well, they all take responsibility as they are all professionals who should be voicing their opinions and getting it right. However, look closely at what our players are asked to do and what the board are providing to assist that order? We currently have an ageing squad who are asked to play a high pressing game against far younger or better opposition. We're asked to go 2 up front against one of the worlds best teams who have come off the back of a near record run of games and then onto another team on a real high and not even think about our players or tactics, but just how we will look on TV ........... if we win. Is that the right way to run a team or do you play to the teams strengths?

Over the last few seasons we've spent money on already ageing players or squad members that are a class or 2 lower than what we already had. Some of these players may enhance the squad in the short term but they aren't players we can use long term, apart from the bench. Now we are left with a first team that needs a good overhaul, needing youth or strong legs and heart to give us the tempo that we are being asked of. The powers that be aren't providing that, it's quite clear, and aren't giving us the team (players and manager/coaches) to prove ourselves on the pitch.

Sheikh Mansour's vision is to challenge the elite, not only in the PL, but in Europe,won't get that whilst his directors are bringing in players that don't actually upgrade on those that we've already got, even though they are getting older. We need players who can do the job asked of them, for at least the 7 or so seconds needed, before sprinting back to protect what we have.

Seven and half minutes, you complain, but trust me, that's probably more than what we've actually got.

[mr_nool]

Very interesting theory, mate. I think you have a very good point.
However, I can't see the board stopping the Count for blooding some youngster. Surely that would be worth trying if he is indeed "forced" to play this systems, and need younger, fitter players to do so.

[Ted Hughes]

We were supposed to sack half the team for winning the title ?

Or when Pellegrini came in, he was supposed to sack half of Mancini's players without even looking at them ? Then teach those players, plus the ones left from Mancini's team, how to play in a new style, knit it all together in a few weeks, and still win the title, with half a team full of new players, some of whom may never have played in the Premier League & half a team who have been drilled in a totally different style of play ?

All whilst being audited & potentially fined, for spending money ?

Not achieving this, is failure by ' the board ' ?


Hows about we evaluate the players out over a period of time, find out which ones are capable of improving in this style of play, discover which fall by the wayside, note where we are lacking, & try to fix it ?

Like when we discover they can't/won't run for more than 10% of a key game ?

I would say that's giving them the chance, & learning something.

[iwasthere2012]

I think, Beefy makes a lot of very valid points. Whether you agree with his analysis of who's fault it is, is up to our own subjective points of view.
What kind of gets to me, particularly after a run of results like the last week, is how polarised opinions seem on here and we seem to take our frustrations out on each other for not agreeing. But I find that if you take a step back at the arguments over quite a number of threads and look at them overall from a distance, then they all very much start to look the same.
By that, I don't only mean that each thread looks the same, but if you stand back quite often people who seem to be arguing against each other look to me like they are basically saying the same thing. Maybe it's me.
Like Beefy above, in essence, I believe we don't have the players to play at the very top level, at the system that seems to be preferred. However I don't see anything in what Ted says to contradict that. Ted seems to say that it's not the system it's the players and it doesn't work whether they play 3, 4 or 5 in midfield. I don't think that is contradictory to the first statement. In fact Ted is saying 'what were the board to do?' in answer to Beefy, which indicates to me that we are in agreement to what the problem is.
I say 'we' even though I haven't joined any of this until now, because as I stated after the Barca game and in another thread after the Liverpool game, everything I agree with and also disagree with has already been said...numerous times.
So who's fault is it all or what is the solution?
Looking across the board I optimistically, hope you are all right. Ted/Beefy/Twosips/Doug/WW/Sparticus etc. etc. There has been a lot of really positive stuff in here too. We all know that this year is a bit of a car crash, but going off Beefy's summation above, you would have to believe that if there is an overriding policy in this club, that has us in the situation we are in now, then it can only be part of a longer-term plan. There is no doubt this squad is ageing. Is this policy. We haven't seen much of youth coming through so far, this is true. Are we going to see a major shift over the coming years. I hope so. There is no doubt from EDS down to under 18's and beyond there seems to be real signs of a City way of playing. It makes sense to me that we have to believe that there will be a generation that will make it here. They are proving they can play this system at under age. Some of them have to step up next year.
Nothing I have seen in The Sheik's time here would suggest to me that they don't have a plan. As some suggest on here maybe this present bunch of players are nearing their end in the current plan, but I don't see this as a golden era over with them. I think the real golden era is yet to come.....and be sure of it, it will come.

[Wonderwall]

I think, Beefy makes a lot of very valid points. Whether you agree with his analysis of who's fault it is, is up to our own subjective points of view.
What kind of gets to me, particularly after a run of results like the last week, is how polarised opinions seem on here and we seem to take our frustrations out on each other for not agreeing. But I find that if you take a step back at the arguments over quite a number of threads and look at them overall from a distance, then they all very much start to look the same.
By that, I don't only mean that each thread looks the same, but if you stand back quite often people who seem to be arguing against each other look to me like they are basically saying the same thing. Maybe it's me.
Like Beefy above, in essence, I believe we don't have the players to play at the very top level, at the system that seems to be preferred. However I don't see anything in what Ted says to contradict that. Ted seems to say that it's not the system it's the players and it doesn't work whether they play 3, 4 or 5 in midfield. I don't think that is contradictory to the first statement. In fact Ted is saying 'what were the board to do?' in answer to Beefy, which indicates to me that we are in agreement to what the problem is.
I say 'we' even though I haven't joined any of this until now, because as I stated after the Barca game and in another thread after the Liverpool game, everything I agree with and also disagree with has already been said...numerous times.
So who's fault is it all or what is the solution?
Looking across the board I optimistically, hope you are all right. Ted/Beefy/Twosips/Doug/WW/Sparticus etc. etc. There has been a lot of really positive stuff in here too. We all no that this year is a bit of a car crash, but going off Beefy's summation above, you would have to believe that if there is an overriding policy in this club, that has us in the situation we are in now, then it can only be part of a longer-term plan. There is no doubt this squad is ageing. Is this policy. We haven't seen much of youth coming through so far, this is true. Are we going to see a major shift over the coming years. I hope so. There is no doubt from EDS down to under 18's and beyond there seems to be real signs of a City way of playing. It makes sense to me that we have to believe that there will be a generation that will make it here. They are proving they can play this system at under age. Some of them have to step up next year.
Nothing I have seen in The Sheik's time here would suggest to me that they don't have a plan. As some suggest on here maybe this present bunch of players are nearing their end in the current plan, but I don't see this as a golden era over with them. I think the real golden era is yet to come.....and be sure of it, it will come.

You are so lucky that you were not here in the Mark Hughes Reign, it wasn't just polarised it was a fan divide and all out war!

[Ted Hughes]

I think, Beefy makes a lot of very valid points. Whether you agree with his analysis of who's fault it is, is up to our own subjective points of view.
What kind of gets to me, particularly after a run of results like the last week, is how polarised opinions seem on here and we seem to take our frustrations out on each other for not agreeing. But I find that if you take a step back at the arguments over quite a number of threads and look at them overall from a distance, then they all very much start to look the same.
By that, I don't only mean that each thread looks the same, but if you stand back quite often people who seem to be arguing against each other look to me like they are basically saying the same thing. Maybe it's me.
Like Beefy above, in essence, I believe we don't have the players to play at the very top level, at the system that seems to be preferred. However I don't see anything in what Ted says to contradict that. Ted seems to say that it's not the system it's the players and it doesn't work whether they play 3, 4 or 5 in midfield. I don't think that is contradictory to the first statement. In fact Ted is saying 'what were the board to do?' in answer to Beefy, which indicates to me that we are in agreement to what the problem is.
I say 'we' even though I haven't joined any of this until now, because as I stated after the Barca game and in another thread after the Liverpool game, everything I agree with and also disagree with has already been said...numerous times.
So who's fault is it all or what is the solution?
Looking across the board I optimistically, hope you are all right. Ted/Beefy/Twosips/Doug/WW/Sparticus etc. etc. There has been a lot of really positive stuff in here too. We all no that this year is a bit of a car crash, but going off Beefy's summation above, you would have to believe that if there is an overriding policy in this club, that has us in the situation we are in now, then it can only be part of a longer-term plan. There is no doubt this squad is ageing. Is this policy. We haven't seen much of youth coming through so far, this is true. Are we going to see a major shift over the coming years. I hope so. There is no doubt from EDS down to under 18's and beyond there seems to be real signs of a City way of playing. It makes sense to me that we have to believe that there will be a generation that will make it here. They are proving they can play this system at under age. Some of them have to step up next year.
Nothing I have seen in The Sheik's time here would suggest to me that they don't have a plan. As some suggest on here maybe this present bunch of players are nearing their end in the current plan, but I don't see this as a golden era over with them. I think the real golden era is yet to come.....and be sure of it, it will come.

It seems to me he's saying that board are not providing the team we need in order to do the job. That's the bit I'm responding too.

I'm saying we are still in the process of finding out which team we need in order to do the job & that solving it needs time patience & persistence.

It's easy for someone to say, with hindsight, that Silva Nasri etc can't press in Liverpool's half for more than 5 mins. But I didn't think that was the case prior to that game & the Barca game.I thought the problem in the past was more down to people like Aguero & Dzeko, not working as hard as Messi, Muller etc do, & leaving the rest of the team overworked. Well I know that was a problem, because I saw it happen. I've also seen Yaya go missing & not do enough defensive work, in all systems from time to time, under two managers.

What Sunday in particular told me, was that you can have Dzeko & Aguero running their bollocks off every bit as much as Muller, Robben & Ribery do, but it still won't solve the problem of Yaya, Silva, Nasri. And even if you take off Dzeko, & replace him with a runner, it still doesn't solve it.

You lot may already have known that, but I didn't. I suspected it could be the case, but in the past, Aguero & Dzeko have sometimes strolled in such games, & therefore it's been impossible for me to judge the midfield.

They didn't stroll on Sunday. We were still unable to work hard enough to execute the game plan.

So we now know the choices imo. We settle for being Chelsea & keep it tight, hope our quality players do enough to win, hope we can mug our way to the Champions League final occasionally, or we continue to strive to play at the level of Real/Barca/Bayern & try to dominate games.

If we wish to play that way, then whoever we have as manager is probably going to need fitter, harder working alternatives to Yaya, Silva & Nasri.

Then we have Zabba etc to think about, but we may already have the solutions to that, at the club & not far off being ready.

[iwasthere2012]

I think, Beefy makes a lot of very valid points. Whether you agree with his analysis of who's fault it is, is up to our own subjective points of view.
What kind of gets to me, particularly after a run of results like the last week, is how polarised opinions seem on here and we seem to take our frustrations out on each other for not agreeing. But I find that if you take a step back at the arguments over quite a number of threads and look at them overall from a distance, then they all very much start to look the same.
By that, I don't only mean that each thread looks the same, but if you stand back quite often people who seem to be arguing against each other look to me like they are basically saying the same thing. Maybe it's me.
Like Beefy above, in essence, I believe we don't have the players to play at the very top level, at the system that seems to be preferred. However I don't see anything in what Ted says to contradict that. Ted seems to say that it's not the system it's the players and it doesn't work whether they play 3, 4 or 5 in midfield. I don't think that is contradictory to the first statement. In fact Ted is saying 'what were the board to do?' in answer to Beefy, which indicates to me that we are in agreement to what the problem is.
I say 'we' even though I haven't joined any of this until now, because as I stated after the Barca game and in another thread after the Liverpool game, everything I agree with and also disagree with has already been said...numerous times.
So who's fault is it all or what is the solution?
Looking across the board I optimistically, hope you are all right. Ted/Beefy/Twosips/Doug/WW/Sparticus etc. etc. There has been a lot of really positive stuff in here too. We all no that this year is a bit of a car crash, but going off Beefy's summation above, you would have to believe that if there is an overriding policy in this club, that has us in the situation we are in now, then it can only be part of a longer-term plan. There is no doubt this squad is ageing. Is this policy. We haven't seen much of youth coming through so far, this is true. Are we going to see a major shift over the coming years. I hope so. There is no doubt from EDS down to under 18's and beyond there seems to be real signs of a City way of playing. It makes sense to me that we have to believe that there will be a generation that will make it here. They are proving they can play this system at under age. Some of them have to step up next year.
Nothing I have seen in The Sheik's time here would suggest to me that they don't have a plan. As some suggest on here maybe this present bunch of players are nearing their end in the current plan, but I don't see this as a golden era over with them. I think the real golden era is yet to come.....and be sure of it, it will come.

It seems to me he's saying that board are not providing the team we need in order to do the job. That's the bit I'm responding too.

I'm saying we are still in the process of finding out which team we need in order to do the job & that solving it needs time patience & persistence.

It's easy for someone to say, with hindsight, that Silva Nasri etc can't press in Liverpool's half for more than 5 mins. But I didn't think that was the case prior to that game & the Barca game.I thought the problem in the past was more down to people like Aguero & Dzeko, not working as hard as Messi, Muller etc do, & leaving the rest of the team overworked. Well I know that was a problem, because I saw it happen. I've also seen Yaya go missing & not do enough defensive work, in all systems from time to time, under two managers.

What Sunday in particular told me, was that you can have Dzeko & Aguero running their bollocks off every bit as much as Muller, Robben & Ribery do, but it still won't solve the problem of Yaya, Silva, Nasri. And even if you take off Dzeko, & replace him with a runner, it still doesn't solve it.

You lot may already have known that, but I didn't. I suspected it could be the case, but in the past, Aguero & Dzeko have sometimes strolled in such games, & therefore it's been impossible for me to judge the midfield.

They didn't stroll on Sunday. We were still unable to work hard enough to execute the game plan.

So we now know the choices imo. We settle for being Chelsea & keep it tight, hope our quality players do enough to win, hope we can mug our way to the Champions League final occasionally, or we continue to strive to play at the level of Real/Barca/Bayern & try to dominate games.

If we wish to play that way, then whoever we have as manager is probably going to need fitter, harder working alternatives to Yaya, Silva & Nasri.

Then we have Zabba etc to think about, but we may already have the solutions to that, at the club & not far off being ready.

Believe me Ted, it may not always sound like it from the muddled way I put my thoughts together sometimes, but I'm singing off the same hymn sheet as you more often than not.

[iwasthere2012]

I think, Beefy makes a lot of very valid points. Whether you agree with his analysis of who's fault it is, is up to our own subjective points of view.
What kind of gets to me, particularly after a run of results like the last week, is how polarised opinions seem on here and we seem to take our frustrations out on each other for not agreeing. But I find that if you take a step back at the arguments over quite a number of threads and look at them overall from a distance, then they all very much start to look the same.
By that, I don't only mean that each thread looks the same, but if you stand back quite often people who seem to be arguing against each other look to me like they are basically saying the same thing. Maybe it's me.
Like Beefy above, in essence, I believe we don't have the players to play at the very top level, at the system that seems to be preferred. However I don't see anything in what Ted says to contradict that. Ted seems to say that it's not the system it's the players and it doesn't work whether they play 3, 4 or 5 in midfield. I don't think that is contradictory to the first statement. In fact Ted is saying 'what were the board to do?' in answer to Beefy, which indicates to me that we are in agreement to what the problem is.
I say 'we' even though I haven't joined any of this until now, because as I stated after the Barca game and in another thread after the Liverpool game, everything I agree with and also disagree with has already been said...numerous times.
So who's fault is it all or what is the solution?
Looking across the board I optimistically, hope you are all right. Ted/Beefy/Twosips/Doug/WW/Sparticus etc. etc. There has been a lot of really positive stuff in here too. We all no that this year is a bit of a car crash, but going off Beefy's summation above, you would have to believe that if there is an overriding policy in this club, that has us in the situation we are in now, then it can only be part of a longer-term plan. There is no doubt this squad is ageing. Is this policy. We haven't seen much of youth coming through so far, this is true. Are we going to see a major shift over the coming years. I hope so. There is no doubt from EDS down to under 18's and beyond there seems to be real signs of a City way of playing. It makes sense to me that we have to believe that there will be a generation that will make it here. They are proving they can play this system at under age. Some of them have to step up next year.
Nothing I have seen in The Sheik's time here would suggest to me that they don't have a plan. As some suggest on here maybe this present bunch of players are nearing their end in the current plan, but I don't see this as a golden era over with them. I think the real golden era is yet to come.....and be sure of it, it will come.

You are so lucky that you were not here in the Mark Hughes Reign, it wasn't just polarised it was a fan divide and all out war!

I stayed away for a long long time, but I used to read it.

[DoomMerchant]

Does the Paddy/Pep thing have a different context after the bollock-dropping week the Count had?

No vampires, no midgets, no dry ice....just shit.

cheers

[Wonderwall]

I think, Beefy makes a lot of very valid points. Whether you agree with his analysis of who's fault it is, is up to our own subjective points of view.
What kind of gets to me, particularly after a run of results like the last week, is how polarised opinions seem on here and we seem to take our frustrations out on each other for not agreeing. But I find that if you take a step back at the arguments over quite a number of threads and look at them overall from a distance, then they all very much start to look the same.
By that, I don't only mean that each thread looks the same, but if you stand back quite often people who seem to be arguing against each other look to me like they are basically saying the same thing. Maybe it's me.
Like Beefy above, in essence, I believe we don't have the players to play at the very top level, at the system that seems to be preferred. However I don't see anything in what Ted says to contradict that. Ted seems to say that it's not the system it's the players and it doesn't work whether they play 3, 4 or 5 in midfield. I don't think that is contradictory to the first statement. In fact Ted is saying 'what were the board to do?' in answer to Beefy, which indicates to me that we are in agreement to what the problem is.
I say 'we' even though I haven't joined any of this until now, because as I stated after the Barca game and in another thread after the Liverpool game, everything I agree with and also disagree with has already been said...numerous times.
So who's fault is it all or what is the solution?
Looking across the board I optimistically, hope you are all right. Ted/Beefy/Twosips/Doug/WW/Sparticus etc. etc. There has been a lot of really positive stuff in here too. We all no that this year is a bit of a car crash, but going off Beefy's summation above, you would have to believe that if there is an overriding policy in this club, that has us in the situation we are in now, then it can only be part of a longer-term plan. There is no doubt this squad is ageing. Is this policy. We haven't seen much of youth coming through so far, this is true. Are we going to see a major shift over the coming years. I hope so. There is no doubt from EDS down to under 18's and beyond there seems to be real signs of a City way of playing. It makes sense to me that we have to believe that there will be a generation that will make it here. They are proving they can play this system at under age. Some of them have to step up next year.
Nothing I have seen in The Sheik's time here would suggest to me that they don't have a plan. As some suggest on here maybe this present bunch of players are nearing their end in the current plan, but I don't see this as a golden era over with them. I think the real golden era is yet to come.....and be sure of it, it will come.

You are so lucky that you were not here in the Mark Hughes Reign, it wasn't just polarised it was a fan divide and all out war!

I stayed away for a long long time, but I used to read it.

Yet you are still here...<Doffs Cap>

[mr_nool]

HUGHES OUT!

[Wonderwall]

HUGHES OUT!

Dont you start, there was nothing wrong with our Leslie sparkytus

[Hazy2]

HUGHES OUT!

Dont you start, there was nothing wrong with our Leslie sparkytus

Frank Clark, so 0-4 at Half Time to Barnsley eh. we drew the second half 0-0 that is a step in the right direction ok thanks a lot all the best.

[City64]

I still haven't got over Hull City and Middlesborough at home last month . Awesome viewing !

[Beefymcfc]

We were supposed to sack half the team for winning the title ?

Or when Pellegrini came in, he was supposed to sack half of Mancini's players without even looking at them ? Then teach those players, plus the ones left from Mancini's team, how to play in a new style, knit it all together in a few weeks, and still win the title, with half a team full of new players, some of whom may never have played in the Premier League & half a team who have been drilled in a totally different style of play ?

All whilst being audited & potentially fined, for spending money ?

Not achieving this, is failure by ' the board ' ?


Hows about we evaluate the players out over a period of time, find out which ones are capable of improving in this style of play, discover which fall by the wayside, note where we are lacking, & try to fix it ?

Like when we discover they can't/won't run for more than 10% of a key game ?

I would say that's giving them the chance, & learning something.

Ok then, if it's not the board then it's all Pellers fault for playing the system he does, and also the board for allowing it to be continued.

Simples.

[Hazy2]

I still haven't got over Hull City and Middlesborough at home last month . Awesome viewing !

Ted can explain that.

[Blue Since 76]

The world cup showed what happens when organised teams with loads of effort play. We look like Spain did, swanning about, thinking our superior football will get us through whilst being overrun.

Football has evolved and we've stood still with an aging and fairly pedestrian squad. That we were out fought and overrun by Arsenal should have set the alarm bells ringing and the scary thing is it's something most premier league teams could do to us if they see the weakness

If only happened to Spain because they played like City, rather than like Barca or Bayern Munich.

In the past they played with more energy.

Football has evolved yes. And it's evolved to where people like Pellegrini are trying to go, not to where people like fucking Souness and Carragher used to be.

Lest we forget, it was Barca who were running rings round us midweek & Bayern who were running rings round our 5 man midfield, with ten men.

If you lookup Nasri & Silva it says 'attacking midfielder'. If you look up Messi Neymar & Suarez it says 'forward'.

Barca plated v City's 4 man midfield, with 3.

They do as they are told & fucking leg it to get the ball back. Then they keep it.

The rest is dumbing down by Sky.

Not sure what Sky has to do with us being shit, Ted. And as for evolved to where Pellegrini wants to go, well maybe it has, but I'm not seeing any evidence of it. He's starting to look like a dinosaur and the team's lack of effort has to come from him.

Well for one, we aren't shit. We have had a few games where we have played shit. We may not quite be good enough to be Champions of England by the end of this season, or knock Barcelona out of the Champions League. But we certainly aren't shit.

And the reference to Sky is because it's Sky & other simplistic tv/media pundits who are dumbing down what Pellegrini is doing & using it as a reason for when we lose, but it's not the reason when we win.

Carragher even said how an 'English manager' would get more stick for playing 442, when no Engilsh manager plays anything like the way City play or ever has.

We have had two intelligent pundits in Bellamy & Martinez who have explained it as is & a bunch of fucking philistines adapting what City do, to suit ther own agenda & quite a few City fans using them as an example to prove how 442 isn't working when we don't even fucking play 442.

Ferguson used to play 442. We are absolutely nothing like that except when we play Milner & Navas out wide. We don't defend like that with 4 across the middle when we lose the ball.

Carragher stops the fucking play shows 5 City players stood in a circle of the pitch doing fuck all & says it down to 442. Is it bollocks. You don't play 442 like that. When Liverpool scored the 2nd goal, every cunt was back there with 5 in midfield. But the talk is of how 442 was the problem. It's fucking nonsense.

As for the workrate being less under Pellegrini. No it isn't.

I rarely watch the analysis during or after our games - I don't need to sit there listening to rags and scousers too scared to be managers who know exactly what every manager has done wrong. So I don't care how dumbed down it is, I wasn't listening.

As for the work rate not being less, it clearly is. In fact, in response to Beefy, you've just said the same thing, that the midfield can't work hard enough without the ball. I'm not going to pick on any individual player, I'm just going to say we don't do it often enough or for long enough. As you stated with, we did it for 7 minutes on Sunday. We occasionally did it against Barca. We did it most of the game against a poor Newcastle. Watch Barca at their best, or Bayern, or Atletico or other top teams and they do it for 90 minutes, or at least until they've beat you.

As work rate has nothing to do with formation, as you could have a front 3 of last season's Aguero (very different to this), Tevez and Dickov and wouldn't notice the lack of men in the middle. Play Adebayor on his own up front and you'll get swamped in midfield.

[Ted Hughes]

Team used to sit more than press.

No less workrate.

[DoomMerchant]

I still haven't got over Hull City and Middlesborough at home last month . Awesome viewing !

Ted can explain that.

now, THAT was funny.

well played

cheers

[City64]

I still haven't got over Hull City and Middlesborough at home last month . Awesome viewing !

Ted can explain that.

With or without his blue tinted specs ?