***City v Hilal CWC Official Match Thread***

[stevefromdonny]

I thought that only captain could go to ref, not all the team even goalie, but atleast goal stood and ref told them why

[carl_feedthegoat]

Cooling break?!
I sincerely fucking hope this gimmicky crap never gets implemented in our league. Total momentum killer, absolutely no place for it in proper football. Keep it out -permanently.

[Sparklehorse]

Another Pep masterclass ffs, it’s exactly the same as last season. So much quality on the bench not being used. While Savinho just bangs his head against a brick wall time and time and time again, he is fucking useless. Haaland is a shadow of his former brilliance. Extra time and we’ll be lucky to get through this.

[Nigels Tackle]

oppo scoring with pretty much every effort on target…

[Nigels Tackle]

superb goal from phil made by cherki

[carolina-blue]

oppo scoring with pretty much every effort on target…

3 on target 3 goals bloody hell

[Nigels Tackle]

oppo scoring with pretty much every effort on target…

3 on target 3 goals bloody hell

make that 4 from 4

[Nigels Tackle]

actually 4 from 5
ederson made a save (wow) from the first effort

[Nigels Tackle]

same old story
dominate the game but can’t put the ball away
then get raped on the counter

[Sparklehorse]

if anyone thinks we are back, think again. Abysmal performance, even more abysmal management. Totally outplayed, outthought by a Saudi Arabian team. A total embarassment. Goodnight

[branny]

Shite defending all round. Ait-Nouri diving in led to the counter for the first. Was watching on my phone so couldn't tell who it was that lumped the ball back into the box for the second instead of keeping possession and then didn't react quick enough to the run. Dias and Aké between them can't handle Koulibaly. Ederson barely moved for the header and then palms one straight out for an unmarked player to bundle it over the line.

[Outcast]

Wake up everyone !!!!! The match is on soon pmsl

Fell asleep before kick off, I hear it's another masterclass performance from last season.

Seeing as you watched it live, tell us what happened Carl, pmsl?

[zabbadabbado]

All on Pep that, and that useless fucker Ederson. who should win Superior Player of the Match for Al Hillal.

Only blessing is we didn't have to watch the useless lump in a Penalty Shoot Out "Jump" 2,3, seconds before every penalty was slotted either side to the opposite which he jumps. His Penalty saving is a site to behold. The fucker just stood occasionally still like a "Traffic Cone" he might save one.

Pep fucked us over again with his stupid fucking management. I swear he came in his Pants when we reverted to last season Insomnia inducing Pass pass pass shit for the entire second half. Fully complimented by his Robots at the back Akanji + Dias + Ake slowing everything down to a Snail pace. He was loving it ,Pep " THIS IS THE WAY". Was fucking horrible. On the Bench were sat all the creative players the game had been begging for from 15 minutes in to the second half.

Rather than trying to win the game in 90 minutes he decides "fuck it i will change nothing until extra time"." Maybe play for penalties with Ederson in Goal for us"

His use of our Squad is bordering on criminal. How the fuck was Khusanov not introduced to try nullify there over the top Balls that were killing us ?
Cherki/Foden introduced far too late.

WTF did he see in Savinho for a full 90 + 6 and extra time. The Man is fucking awful as a winger. He creates literally nothing other than opposition counters. He really was shockingly bad. Yet even when Baldy made creative Subs he left Savinho on doing nothing.

First 3 games we saw a lot of positivity. Faster football, better movement. Yet tonight Pep went right back to that shit show style from last season the second half, same faces again on the Pitch. Whilst expensive signings seemingly can not get regular minutes WTF goes through his Head ?

Ederson should get on the Plane to Saudi with Al Hillal to collect his Bung.

[salford city]

Cancel the flights. The worry is first time we really need to show up and Pep reverts to factory settings. What's the plan from here - do we come back home and get straight back into pre-season or line up some friendlies. Bit of a shit-show

[PeterParker]

Watched just the highlights, but I will come back on what I've said the other day about Ederson.
Thank you, but he needs to go. He is far too inconsistent and yes, he was a significant part of our game, but it is time to change our game from this borefest and have a proper gk that brings calmness to our game.

Regarding Pep, it seemed the usual brainfarts, the usual shit rotation and players out of position. Inzaghi, like other managers, has his number and did what he needed to win (I still think we won that final because Lukaku fucked up, not because we were better).

I am somewhat gutted. I didn't care at all about this tournament, but I am fuming because we seem to be heading towards the same shite.

[Mase]

Does the bald cunt have something against Khus? We've not seen him since he won POTM.

We've bought Cherki, a creative player that we were crying out for and he's on the bench constantly.

If he carries on playing this pass pass pass pass always sideways and backwards he's going to piss off a lot of fans. The guy proving again he's lost the plot.

[Crossie]

We’ll get over it. It’ll ground us & gets us an extra weeks rest which is no doubt needed. I have a feeling though we might have another season of “are we better without Haaland”? Actually we’ll probably have about 9 more of those seasons….

Some games yes, some no. Pep needs a rethink on what he asks Haaland to do, I want to see a season of him dropping deeper and full centre backs out to create some space in the middle.

[sheblue]

Watched the game, probably shouldn't have bothered. Yes losing sucks, yes there is good prize money, but I am not too worried about going out.
It has been a shit tournament, shit crowds, shit teams, shit atmosphere, shit soul-less stadiums, shit times etc. The whole thing is just plastic fake shit.
Glad we can take a break from football and then prepare for the new season.

[PeterParker]

We’ll get over it. It’ll ground us & gets us an extra weeks rest which is no doubt needed. I have a feeling though we might have another season of “are we better without Haaland”? Actually we’ll probably have about 9 more of those seasons….

Some games yes, some no. Pep needs a rethink on what he asks Haaland to do, I want to see a season of him dropping deeper and full centre backs out to create some space in the middle.

The fastest player to reach 300 goals, better than arguably the best players that graced this game: Messi and Tranny.
An absolute goal machine we needed and huge part of the treble.

Neah, he will be better with another manager. Any manager at this point.
There isn't a player in this world that can be that focused for 90 minutes and be ready for two proper opportunities after 9000 side passes per game. It can't, it's draining.
Pep's system is taking the life out of him and remember that another world class one, Sergio, was another one that he didn't want.
Remember he wanted Kane, not Haaland.

[Dub City]

The tournament is over for us and probably no preseason games to bed in to see who is an option for next season and we Haven’t given Kushmanov a proper run in any of the games, what are we going to learn playing Akanji beyond he is a £15m player for cover and not good enough to be a starter for us at centre half and always has a mistake in him at full back

Bobb not sure if it’s fitness or not that hasn’t been given minutes to try him from the right when we have Savinho doing same as last season producing very little, prefer him from left but looks missed chance to see an alternative. That ignoring seeing what Cherki could do with more minutes from there.

And the most puzzling one for me, where does Nico Gonzalez fit in to the squad at all. He wasn’t some bargain signing we picked up in January, was a big outlay and we haven’t tried him as holding role, haven’t tried him further up. How do we know if he can play holding role to give Rodri a break or is it going to be a season of throwing Gundo in there to do a holding role he wasn’t suited to at 28 let alone at 34.

Lot of business to be done between now and start of season. Don’t think we can win the league on what either of our keepers served up in last 12 months. Still think we are crying out for a right back that can defend. Nunes tries but he is a square peg thrown in there and will get exposed against top opposition. Then we have Grealish , Walker, Philips and more to be shifted.

Have to take the positives of the decent play produced in group stages. Didn’t see game back yet but from clips of goals, conceding from our own corner looks like defence not improved on last season issues which is a big worry