…like a big leaky thing in the market town of Leek on Friday & Saturday; we produced a solid, organised and professional display to ease past new-comers Brighton.
What a start to the Prem!
I personally think the last 2 seasons at
least have been very unpredictable both scoreline and club-finishing-position-wise
but…what the hell was going on at the weekend (Friday included)?!
We started with a 7-goal thriller as Arsenal shipped in 3 goals at home only to finally
overcome Leicester City 4-3 and in a game
with almost as many goals; the next match
saw Watford share a 3-3 draw with visitors Liverpool!
Not enough excitement for you? Try Chelsea being 0-3 down at home to Burnley; seeing 2 of their players sent off before
pulling it back to an eventual 2-3 defeat – just your 5 goals
there…
Huddersfield Town, back in the ‘top flight’ for
the first time in 45 years, slammed 3 past hosts Crystal Palace and kept a clean sheet to go top of the table as things stand right
now!
Huh…shame on Southampton
& Swansea City, then, for producing a
0-0 draw and on Everton & West Bromwich Albion also; who could “only” manage
1-0 home wins against Stoke City & AFC Bournemouth respectively…
So where do we stand in that mixed bag of ‘week 1’?
I think
that puts us somewhere ‘in between’ in our opening match – we didn’t exactly
light up the stage and as time ticked along without breaching the home side’s
many defensive walls, there was a level of anxiety from the watching City fans
in the pub I was in that appeared to be shared on Pep’s
face, as the camera increasingly focused on the Spaniard in the second half.
We were
efficient & well organised; pushing the home side further and further back
into their own half, where they appeared to start in a 5-3-2 and later switched
to a 6-3-1 as we increased the almost endless pressure.
But we
did it in a plodding, slow-passing way for large parts and we also looked a
little lopsided. No slight meant on new signing Danilo
- who had a very good pre-season on both
flanks of the defence - but he struggled in an attacking sense yesterday, I
thought. No issues in-him defending and he is far less one-footed than
the recently-departed Aleks Kolarov. But he clearly
isn’t comfortable ‘whipping them in’ with his left foot; as he constantly had
to 'check' his run to turn and tap the ball inside with his right peg yesterday.
That slowed any attack we tried to muster down that side of the pitch.
Fernandinho did okay in a protecting,
breaking-up role but he’s no Yaya with
regards to killer passes on the ‘front foot’. I think we missed the Ivorian in that respect on Saturday evening and, together with the other aspects of our game
that I’ve mentioned, we almost paid the price early in the second half; as The
Seagulls came close on two occasions to-taking the lead.
 |
| Kyle Walker - a crackin' competative debut |
But the
other flank was a completely different story. Kyle Walker had
a terrific, MotM performance game both defending and in attack and once Kevin De Bruyne decided to join the party, the
pair caused havoc! If
only Kevin could do that for 70% of games and not just 30 or 40% of the time…
 |
| Gabriel Jesus - effort aplenty |
We still
seem to struggle to stick the ball in the net – a real issue from last season despite the creation we had in 2016 / 17 and
still have in the side – but it’s not through want of trying.
And, as I alluded to in my first blog-posting of the season on Friday, it does concern me a little that we’re leaving on the bench the
likes of Leroy Sane & Bernardo Silva (and
Yaya) in favour of 3 central defenders and 2 defender wing-backs when, as happened yesterday, we often struggled
to crack the oppo’s defence for 70 minutes of the contest. I’m confident, however,
that things will look different once fitness & sharpness properly ‘kicks in’
and when we get flying left-wing-back Benjamin Mendy over his niggle and in the side.
And, I think and would hope, we’ll be quicker
to make subs at home in certain games to a 4-4-2 / 4-5-1 when required also.
 |
| Cracked 'em! Aguero gives City the lead after a terrifc move. |
As for
yesterday at the Amex Stadium, we ‘got there
in the end’ and I bet the likes of Chelsea & Liverpool would snap our hand
off to swap 3 points and a clean sheet with us!
3
points, clean sheet, no injuries, job done. And didn’t we look good in maroon?
We finally look like ‘City away’.
Next?
 |
| Estadi Montilivi |
City are
off to Spain for 4 days now for some (VERY) warm weather training and a
recently-arranged friendly against Girona.
With the Everton home game being pushed to a Monday night (8:00pm BST) it’s given City time to fly off and play
against one of our ‘sister clubs’.
I’m off
on holiday myself tomorrow for 5 days but should be back in time to pop a
pre-Everton blog-posting on.
Thanks,
as always, for reading and I’ll see you soon.
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