Before this weekend’s game against Leicester City, the Manchester City manager wanted there to be six substitutions. After being humiliated on Saturday, he moaned that he is not a manager for “tackles”.
Rather bizarre statements coming from someone who is supposedly the best manager in the world. When Guardiola became City manager in August, he said that he would show how to play beautiful football in the league. His team barely had to break sweat in their first 10 games, getting off to a perfect start. Since then things have been looking grim for City and Guardiola though.
Manchester City have won only 4 out of their last 15 matches and the players have looked anything but comfortable on the field. It looks like another season of scrapping to make the Champions League might beckon again for City.
Guardiola’s side were thrashed by a team that has gone from Premier League Champions to relegation candidates in less than a year. Calling their defence an embarrassment would be an understatement. The decision to play Bacary Sagna and Aleksandar Kolarov alongside the already struggling John Stones made zero sense.
Talking about decisions that make no sense, why did Guardiola replace Joe Hart with Claudio Bravo? Joe Hart may not be the best goalkeeper in the world, but he definitely is better than Bravo, who looks like an outfield player being forced to play in goal.
Bravo has conceded from 5 of the last 6 shots on target he has faced and having a shabby defence in front of him does not help. Teams now fancy themselves of breaking past City on the counter-attack. And since Guardiola doesn’t teach tackles, all City can hope for is that their opponents don’t manage to hit the target against them.
The attackers aren’t firing either
As disappointing as their expensively built defence has been, their attackers haven’t exactly shone either. Their first shot on target against Leicester City came in the final 10 minutes, when they were already 4-0 down.
It seemed as though City gave up just 5 minutes. Despite having the likes of David Silva, Kevin De Bruyne and Jesus Navas on the pitch, City failed to test the same Leicester City team that was bundled over by the likes of Chelsea, Liverpool and Manchester United earlier in the season.
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It seems that Guardiola doesn’t know what his best shape or team is 5 months into his tenure. The Manchester City manager has made 50 line-up changes this season, 11 more than second-placed Swansea City.
Perhaps Guardiola underestimated the Premier League and is now struggling to cope. Perhaps he thought that Manchester City players were at the same level as Barcelona and Bayern Munich.
Either way, a lot of work needs to be done if City are to challenge for the title. And Pep Guardiola needs to do it soon with the festive period upon us. Otherwise he may well have to “go home” like he promised at the start of the season.