15 Questions for Manuel Pellegrini, the Board and the Players
7 Apr
Rather than another 2,000 words questioning the direction of this season and how a largely flat performance led to frustration once again, here is a list of fifteen questions that are on the lips of all supporters. The answers are not entirely clear.
City were joint top of the table in January. Why has the season petered out so badly since then?
Why do we not have a clear plan when we play, other than to give the ball to Aguero and hope for the best?
When we won nine successive games in November/December, all were achieved with one striker up front. Why does Pellegrini not realise this is our best formation?
Why does he persist with 4-4-2, a formation which does not suit our best players and leaves us lacking in balance?
Why, for tough away games when you need to battle and fight for the right to play football, is James Milner, one of City’s players of the season, not an automatic starter?
Our corners are a joke. They are surely the easiest thing to practise in football; the angle and distance are always the same, and there is never a player blocking the delivery. Why are we so hopeless?
Dropped points against the likes of Burnley, QPR and Hull have cost us heavily this season. What is wrong with the players’ mentality that so many of City defeats come against far inferior sides?
Why is Pellegrini incapable of changing a game from the bench? Losing 2-0, he left Nasri and Milner on the bench until the 75th and 87th minute respectively.
Why does he change the defence each game? Rotation is necessary when you are still in four competitions, but not when you have one game a week.
Has Edin Dzeko ever retained possession?
Why do the players not all come over to the fans after a game to acknowledge their support? After an abject defeat like last night, fans do not want to see the likes of Yaya and Nasri just walk straight down the tunnel.
Why are we so off the pace in the Champions League?
Why has the recruitment been so average since winning the league against QPR?
Why has the squad been allowed to become stale and ageing? Of yesterday’s starting XI, Aguero is the only outfield player under 28.
The gap between reserve team football and the Premier League is huge, but why has only one Academy player been given a chance this season?
It does begin to look as though it’s a lack of footballing intelligence. Bad luck, also; as typified by last night’s game. But mostly a lack of nous.
1. Lack of desire and an arrogance in quite a few, not all, of the players that they believe they are so good that all they’ve got to do is to walk onto that pitch and they will win. The reality is a lot different.
2. Even though we still managed to win the league last season, I still believe our performances have dramatically declined sine Negredo got injured and his subsequent loss of form. Up until then we were virtually invincible and looked liked we’d score at every single attack. Now we very rarely look like scoring even with all the possession we have. Our biggest problem is is that we are too slow. Navas not good enough. Adam Johnson was a better winger than him. Nasri is only interested in being top of the passing stats. But what does he achieve for the team from all those hundreds of going nowhere passes? Nothing. Dzeko???? Well, what can be said that already hasn’t been said? He’s just rubbish. One good game a season is simply not good enough.
3. Pellers will never change his system unless it’s forced upon him by injuries or suspensions. He’s totally out of his depth. Naive, arrogant, stupid, stubborn etc etc game after game after game.
4. Same as 3!
5. Pellers will even bring on a 36 year old before he brings on Milner. What does that say to the player? If he’s got any sense Milner will be off to Liverpool where they’ll appreciate him more. Why is it we give away all our fighters? De Jong etc???????
6. With all the height we have in our team to attack corners and yet it’s now around 220 since we scored from one is baffling! Majority of the time the cross doesn’t even get passed the first man, which is so poor. Do we not practice them?
7. See No1.
8. See No3.
9. Same as above. Just more evidence that Pellers isn’t up to the job.
10. There’s more work in a sick note than in Edwina Dzeko. He is rubbish. An elephant would have better ball control.
11. My mate works on the City Live gigs etc and the reason he refuses to buy a season ticket is because he witnesses first hand how the majority of the players can’t be bothered. They just want their £100,000+ pay packets and to sod off home to their Alderley Edge mansions. They don’t care about the fans.
12. We are simply scared to death in the Champions League. The fear is clear to see. Man Utd’s youngsters had no fear and went after them. And we’re, again, too slow and not fit enough.
13. Is it the restrictions of the FFP rules? Maybe to a degree. But I think more to blame is the guys with those names we can’t pronounce who are picking and buying the mediocre players we’ve bought since then. And getting rid of players who were better than the ones replacing them! Go figure??????
14. See No13.
15. I’ve seen quite a few games of the U21′s. Can’t think of anyone in particular that I thought is ready for the first team. Or, in fact, will ever be?
Pellers is a stubborn mule. Our best month was December and it begs the question why?
It truly baffles me that he started two striker up front esp when one is Dzeko who contributes nothing. I have said many times before , and I was told chill out it is just bad day in the office, that our defense leaks. You got to go back basics and not to lose games before you think of winning them. If that means to play with 3 DMs and park the bus with a boring football, then so be it.
What is the purpose of attacking philosophy if you can not f… score! and leak goals and give up leads …
And same shit again after the game that we played well, all is okay blah blah blah.
Everyone knows to beat City you have to sit back, absorb pressure, let City have all the possession and then hit the slow City on counters. The scenario has been going on almost on a weekly basis. It seems the only one who fails to see it is this old mule.
When things go bad, the worst thing you can do is to do nothing about it and that is what he is doing. I would be happy if they would do something about it even if they fail. At least you know someone is trying to fix it. But the delusion of “all is ok”, “bad day in the office” are the ones that are going to kill you and cost you dearly
This is my first posting on your highly respected site. I read the majority of postings and find myself nodding in agreement to both your views and those of fellow passionate Blues.
I have been a loyal blue the whole of my life, the last 50 years have been ‘challenging’ in so many ways.
Like the rest of us blues i have seen an awful lot of lows and really only a handful of highs in comparison. My expectation levels were never unrealistic and anything we did achieve we celebrated the life out of it. The football was not always pleasant to the eye but the commitment and passion were evident.
My expectation levels have changed dramatically now we have a club that is the envy of world football. The foundations of a successful club are there for all to see with an infrastructure to promote excellence.
The last few years have been fabulous and City have played the type of football anyone in the world would pay to watch with attacking flare, tempo, resolute defending and presence. Teams had come to fear playing the mighty blues home or away.
On paper we have the most talented ‘squad’ of players in European football but we now only have half a ‘team’. There is little or no tempo or fluidity and our tactics seem rigid and predictable. There are obvious candidates for criticism who appear to prevent the team from playing as a team but who occasionally save us from defeat and at the time get placated.
There are excuses quoted that the squad might be ageing and in need of restoration and how FFP has somewhat hindered development, but there seems to be something quite wrong within. There seems to be an air of superiority and arrogance with some of these players coupled with a childish petulance. Gary Neville was right when he said the players have a ‘mentality problem’. The sad thing is the players are good enough technically and certainly not ‘past it’.
If the players think they can continue to play at this mundane, insipid pace and not even try to match the opposition for commitment and passion then they are reaping the rewards of their inflamed superiority.
The lack of any tempo sees us trying to break down the opposition who have learned to park the bus and absorb a period of sustained pressure ( !!! You know.. a bit like attack verses defence in training..!!!!) then hit us on the break because they know only a few players are prepared to track back and defend while the rest defer responsibility.
I love my City and i always will but i am saddened to continue to witness these insipid displays. This is not what Manchester City is all about. There is something quite unacceptable of losing a game in the wrong manner. If the players come off the pitch having tried everything and given their all and have still lost, we as supporters respect that as there is a certain morality and honesty about it.
There is no shame in losing. The shame is in how you lose.
Our magnificent Captain looks like a victim of the failures of those in front of him and he appears have lost his ability to establish control. He looks like half the player he was but he will return to from and once again be the role model to others of what it means to play for City, and what it means to us.
I love my City. I always will.
CTID.
Have a read of Paul Merson’s predictions of who should go in his Sky Sports column, he has it spot on, bar one.
Get rid of;
Sagna
Kolarov
Toure
Fernando
Fernandinho
Navas
Dzeko
Jovetic
…….and Pellegrini.
I’d also get rid of Nasri.
Merse thinks we will lose Milner, as I think we all do. And that just about sums up our management team.
So we’ve got a few quid we need to spend this summer!!!!
And to make matters worse for me personally, I sit in the East Stand on Level 2. This season I paid £835 for my 19 league games. The club has just informed me that if I want to retain my seat for next season then I have to pay up, wait for it and brace yourselves……..£1,750!!!!!!! It’s an absolute joke and insult. The cancer has spread right through the management of the club that they’ve completely lost all sense of reality and loyalty to their fans.
“We can still win the league – Manuel Pellegrini.”
2015: P16, W6, D3, L7.
“A delusion is a belief held with strong conviction despite superior evidence to the contrary”.
Manager needs to go, big time. I have not liked the manager since the second half of last season. And yes i know we won the league last season but i could begin to see this mess coming. Were playing lifelessly stupid kamakaze football, we should have won the league at a canter last season and we nearly managed to blow it. This season is a disgrace, players have to answer too, but quite simply this team embodies the manager. We need a new direction big time. A win against United won’t change my mind about that either. We can’t even take a corner kick for God sake.
The blaming of the manager is a game that gets more tedious by the season. Is MP faultless? Absolutely not. He clearly has a stubborn (and possibly naïve) approach to some of his tactics (which manager doesn’t?), but I do believe that part of our issues lie with players’ inability to carry out the tactical objectives.
The football that was produced last season was fantastic – quite how people were questioning the direction of the team halfway through last season is either a damning indictment of the modern football fan or a function of selective memory syndrome. The players, I’d argue, are largely to blame with too many of them way off their best – how can all that be blamed on MP? And who do we get to replace him who is a noticeable improvement? The number of obvs candidates is few and far between.
The reality is that we have bought too many squad players (Sagna, Navas, Caballero etc) and not enough star players. Clearly that was part of the plan (2 good players for every position), but I think we need to revert to buying fewer players, but those that are purchased are world class. It is, ultimately, the quality of the team that decides who wins leagues and cups and not the manager.
Managing players are the job of the manager. They did not hire him to wear a suit and look good. It is true many players are off their best, but I beg to differ that this should not be an issue against Burnly, Hull, Crystal palace, etc. Your argument may hold some water, if you pit them against Chelsea, Arsenal, Real, etc. It is not that within one year of winning the league the squad goes south all of a sudden. It has not even been a year since they played their last match to win the title.
The problem has been going on for so long. Though as you mentioned players are at fault, at the end of the day the buck stops with manager. It is solely his responsibility to manager resources at his disposal. And if he can not then he is not doing his job.
According to lots of therapist there is no why. There’s a how ‘ what’ where…. Why did the pilot crash into the alps?? Because he’s a spanner etc or got dumped or whatever. Who is Gary Neville?? I really can’t believe people take him so seriously. He’s not Marcus Aurelius. He will teach you very little. England team anybody??? The season has being atrocious – starting from the top with the lampard fiasco. We will learn from this. The club at board level must sit down together & listen to the fans opinion & humbly accept that “this” season has being a big eye opener. What blows hot will cool down again. Lets win this derby.