Manchester City 2014-15: Now With as Many Top Flight Titles as Wednesday

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Stanley Steamer

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Yeah, I was going to post that at 2-0, it's probably got beyond them. At 3-0, it's now about damage limitation.
What a blast from Navas! A keeper has to expect cross from him, so when he hits it hard near side, it's almost impossible to stop.
Ruh-roh. PK. Red card.
4-0.
 

Dummy Hoy

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When I can watch every Wednesday game with quality feed I won't give a shit if they're in the 4th division.

Now? I want the NBC option.
 

teddykgb

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Screw that.  Wednesday showed up and came to play and played well for 60 minutes. There's no reason to think that they couldn't compete for 90 with a bit more Prem experience.  City can put 4 past anyone in this league.
 

Dummy Hoy

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teddykgb said:
Screw that.  Wednesday showed up and came to play and played well for 60 minutes. There's no reason to think that they couldn't compete for 90 with a bit more Prem experience.  City can put 4 past anyone in this league.
 
I appreciate the kind words, but there's a couple of things here:
 
1. While I agree that City can have that 7 minute burst against virtually anyone, that was mostly City's second team. As talented and expensive as they are, the first team might have made things worse. You could clearly see the quality of the starters (Dzeko, Yaya, Milner), and had Aguero, Silva, and Zaba been there, it would have been even more dire. The gap between PL top 4 and a Championship club is immense. If Wednesday fielded that side every week in the Premier League, they'd be lucky to win 8 games. I see some useful parts, but that's not a PL caliber side.
 
2. The red card was what really killed things. That burst of goals to start the second half obviously put things away, but overall Wednesday was defending pretty well, Wednesday's left side excluded (I think 5 of the goals came off of City's right side). After the card (and the PK), it was a bit shambles against a very talented group of players who had complete freedom to open it up. Tough to watch, but well deserved thrashing.
 
Once again the Wednesday fans brought it though- I could hear them the entire match. My favorite chant was after they went down 5-0, Wednesday fans started in with "When we score, We're coming on the pitch" Wednesday fans have a funny attitude...a proud group but very defeatist. They've turned this into a sort of self-mocking demeanor, which lets them have fun no matter how bad they're getting pasted. 
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ocw90QpBsJw
 

LTF

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Europa League, here we come. Three points behind Roma now and way behind in goal differential. Followed it on the Guardian blog ... Sounds like Cole and Maicon (combined age: 66) had field days, the midfield was listless until the introduction of Milner, Yaya = blech, and Dzeko was similarly impotent.

Just another European night where City is humbled. Getting to be old hat now.
 

Morgan's Magic Snowplow

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Pellegrini's tactics are just bizarre.  First...playing 4-4-2 again against a European squad with a really good three man midfield, no surprise that Roma controlled the match in the first half.  Second, adapting to this by taking off both Navas for Milner and Dzeko for Lampard.  Great, now he has a million centralish midfielders but no width and nobody other than Aguero and Silva to conjure a goal in a match he really had to win.
 

NickEsasky

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Morgan's Magic Snowplow said:
Pellegrini's tactics are just bizarre.  First...playing 4-4-2 again against a European squad with a really good three man midfield, no surprise that Roma controlled the match in the first half.  Second, adapting to this by taking off both Navas for Milner and Dzeko for Lampard.  Great, now he has a million centralish midfielders but no width and nobody other than Aguero and Silva to conjure a goal in a match he really had to win.
 I've been watching City since LTF recommended them to me like 11 years ago, but I am still kind of a novice when it comes to this stuff so my apologies in advance if this is a dumb question. How much do you think the schedule of recent games between the EPL and Champions league played a factor in the alignment and substitutions for Pellegrini? 
 

Morgan's Magic Snowplow

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NickEsasky said:
 I've been watching City since LTF recommended them to me like 11 years ago, but I am still kind of a novice when it comes to this stuff so my apologies in advance if this is a dumb question. How much do you think the schedule of recent games between the EPL and Champions league played a factor in the alignment and substitutions for Pellegrini? 
 
The City fans could answer better than I could but their surrounding fixtures (@Hull, @Villa) don't seem that tough/important to me, so I don't see why they would really have affected this match, which clearly was the highest priority.
 

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Need to see the Dzeko one again but the Kolarov is still fresh in my mind and it looked really soft; minimal, if any contact, theatrical fall to ground by the CSKA player. Add break at the moment, no doubt we'll get to see the key decisions from all available angles. However, city have to be able to kill the game and they lacked composure towards the end of the second half. Sometimes you have to play like Chelsea.
 

Morgan's Magic Snowplow

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teddykgb said:
 
My reaction as I watched this was roughly "What the fuck is that guy doing?  Go for the ball, nobody is every going to give that penalty...see the ball is cleared....wait why is everybody stopping?"
 
The most damning thing is that the CSKA player really makes no attempt whatsoever to control the ball (it bounces off the outside of his shin but he's clearly not trying to do anything with it).  All he's trying to do is thrust his body into Kolarov's path to draw contact.
 
Edit: On the bright side for you guys, Bayern is already 3-0 up on Roma within 27minutes.
 

teddykgb

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That's actually kind of a filthy free kick routine, sealing the last man and just hitting it low....I odn't know that many keepers would see and save that, it's entirely on being aware of the routine and setting a wall that prevents it (which obviously didn't happen)
 

Schnerres

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teddykgb said:
That's actually kind of a filthy free kick routine, sealing the last man and just hitting it low....I odn't know that many keepers would see and save that, it's entirely on being aware of the routine and setting a wall that prevents it (which obviously didn't happen)
If my U17 keeper gets a goal like that, i would tell him it was his fault. Every keeper learns from Day1 in goal going forward that his job on a free-kick is to cover primarily the keepers corner. Low shot, high shot, whatever, it´s his corner. And honestly, that shot from Alonso was not that hard, it was just perfectly executed with the own-wall. And if i see the slowmo three times, i see Aguero was giving no effort to stay behind that opposing wall and was easily pushed away.
http://www.caughtoffside.com/2014/11/25/video-how-cheeky-was-this-xabi-alonso-scores-clever-free-kick-bayern-munich-level-against-man-city/
 

teddykgb

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Schnerres said:
If my U17 keeper gets a goal like that, i would tell him it was his fault. Every keeper learns from Day1 in goal going forward that his job on a free-kick is to cover primarily the keepers corner. Low shot, high shot, whatever, it´s his corner. And honestly, that shot from Alonso was not that hard, it was just perfectly executed with the own-wall. And if i see the slowmo three times, i see Aguero was giving no effort to stay behind that opposing wall and was easily pushed away.
http://www.caughtoffside.com/2014/11/25/video-how-cheeky-was-this-xabi-alonso-scores-clever-free-kick-bayern-munich-level-against-man-city/
 
I mean, of course all of this is true, is it just better if i describe it as cheeky? The mistake is on Hart, but I bet that routine would work against a shocking amount of teams, look at the Bayern player seal the end of City's wall -- every bit of that was planned.  Maybe they saw something on film in regards to Hart.  I guess I agree with you guys that it's an absolutely audacious goal to give up, I guess I just sort of admire Pep/Bayern in the sense that they were audacious enough to try it.
 

teddykgb

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Zomp said:
Bayern gifted them all 3 chances but he is NOT the person you want them to fall to.
 
Rafinha looked like he was trying to foul him.  I don't disagree with you much, but with the way Bayern pass across the back I think a certain amount of that is inevitable.  An absolutely stolen win, although Bayern's goals weren't exactly shining footballing moments either.
 

NickEsasky

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teddykgb said:
We just need to rename this thread Sergio Aguero FC.
 
That's what we've become.  And right now, I'm more than OK with it
This. Wow what a beast.
 

NickEsasky

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Aguero out 4-6 weeks with ligament damage in his knee. That's not good. Especially with Toure leaving for home country duty in Africa. City needs to find a way to get Lampard to stick around longer. Also it would be nice for Jovetic and Dzeko to step up in his absence. I wonder if this means City goes hard after a striker when the transfer window opens. 
 

Stanley Steamer

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Congratulations to all (or is that 'both') the City supporters out there. Solid game tonight, with two well-taken goals. They certainly have made life hard on themselves, but having got through, they may pose an unwelcome challenge to whomever draws them in the next round.
Or not.
 

teddykgb

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doldmoose34 said:
Thank god David Silva is healthy
City haven't gotten enough credit for surviving such a complete injury crisis this season (again). It's great to have a really deep and expensive squad but the last few years have been ridiculous with injuries
 

soxfan121

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teddykgb said:
City haven't gotten enough credit for surviving such a complete injury crisis this season (again). It's great to have a really deep and expensive squad but the last few years have been ridiculous with injuries
 
#oilmoneyproblems
 

Schnerres

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Morgan's Magic Snowplow said:
City is apparently close to buying Bony, with a fee of at least £30m.
 
He seems like a good alternative to (maybe replacement for, in the end) Dzeko as a big central striker off which Aguero or Jovetic can play, especially in Premier League matches in which they go 4-4-2.  £30m is steep but that's the world in which we live.  I have no idea how this might impact City's leeway in future dealings with respect to FFP.
 
 
SoxFanInPdx said:
With Aguero and Dzeko injured £30m is on the high side, but not by much. He was the top scorer in the league for the calendar year of 2014 and netted 26 goals last season. Look at the fees Soldado, Dzeko, Negredo, Lallana, Lamela and Lukaku went for and Bony's fee doesn't look so bad.
 
Maybe Bony takes another step forward and i´m wrong, but paying this sum seems like a very steep price. He scores like 0.5 goals per match in about 50 Premier League matches so far, which is good, but what happens when Aguero is back (which should happen nowadays)? He will sit on the bench and be No.2, then this sum will be huge (too much for me) for someone who will leave in 12-18months for less money than bought just like Negredo did, to buy the next striker in line.
 

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Schnerres said:
 
 
 
Maybe Bony takes another step forward and i´m wrong, but paying this sum seems like a very steep price. He scores like 0.5 goals per match in about 50 Premier League matches so far, which is good, but what happens when Aguero is back (which should happen nowadays)? He will sit on the bench and be No.2, then this sum will be huge (too much for me) for someone who will leave in 12-18months for less money than bought just like Negredo did, to buy the next striker in line.
 
I see it as City getting very worried about Aguero's frailty.
 
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