…where Pep rotated / rested our main players and not last Saturday’s F.A. Cup semi-final?
Pep knows best?
Of course, he and his staff will have been monitoring the recovery levels of their players following the 2nd leg game against Borussia Dortmund and, yes…the Chelsea game did only come less than 72 hours after the final whistle in Germany, which then included travel time back to the UK…before then travelling from Manchester to London.
And if they had spotted that some players were struggling a little and weren’t quite ready then yeah; I suppose it was wise to leave some of ‘em out seeing as we’re already in another domestic final and have eyes firmly set on both regaining the Premier League and at LEAST giving ourselves a crack at the Champions League by trying to get to the final for the first ever time.
But to change 8 players when we were so close to the F.A. Cup final? Eight?!
In our manager’s defence, some of those players brought in are, of course, very good – I thought Laporte had an excellent game, for example, and it reminded me how daft some City fans online sounded when the pairing of Stone & Dias was working so well; where some of ‘em effectively turned on the Frenchman by suggesting that he had ‘lost a yard’ and was a ‘spent force’ at City (WHAT THE HELL?!).
But c’mon…we were 90+ minutes away from the final of a world-famous cup final and he picks Benjamin Mendy; an out of form Joao Cancelo, a terribly out of form Raheem Sterling, a barely-played / yet to impress Ferran Torres and two defensive midfielders who are hardly blessed with pace against a pacey, counter-attacking side.
The only reason I wasn’t terribly gutted as the final whistle blew was because a certain resignation & disappointment had already wafted over me when I saw the team sheet before kick-off…and my mood didn’t improve much during the game.
Now here’s the thing for me…
Give your (much) better players 55 / 60 minutes against Chelsea; try to win the game / progress to the final and then give ‘em a full, well-deserved week off before the final of the League Cup. It might not have worked; we may still have lost but I don’t think we would have done if we’d have played Zinchenko, Walker, Foden & Mahrez at the very least for 2/3s of the match.
It would have to be a monumental disaster, now I would suggest, for us to not win the Premier League; despite the ‘closing gap’ in recent weeks. That being the case, in my opinion we could have “risked” resting some key players in THIS fixture and before another trip to Wembley; a game that’s now got an extra ‘air of uncertainty’ about it with Tottenham having dispensed with their manager on Monday, in terms of how their players will react either way to their interim manager. Of course, we’d then have the dilemma of who would be fit & raring to go once again against PSG just 3 days after facing Spurs on a big pitch / in a big occasion but, hey; that’s what happens when you’re successful in all-four cup competitions.
And now?
And what does Guardiola do now - play his strongest / near-strongest 11 against Villa and then repeat a ‘Wembley wobble’ by largely selecting a ‘second 11’ once again; so that big players are rested before the Champions League semi-final first leg 3 days later?
I just think that with his team selection last Saturday he’s now got the game / player rotation all ‘a bit out of kilter’…
v Aston Villa
 |
| Villa Park |
Predicted line-up, subs and outcome:
(Number correct from the starting line-up in the last game: A shocking 4/11!).
Fluid 4-1-4-1 / 4-5-1 / 4-3-3:
____________________Jesus____________________
Foden__________________________________Mahrez
__________Gundogan_________Silva_____________
_____________________Rodri____________________
Zinchenko_______________________________Walker
______________Ake___________Stones____________
____________________Ederson___________________
Subs: Steffen, Cancelo, Mendy, Dias, Garcia, Laporte, Fernandinho, Sterling, Torres.
Ederson in net.
I have to believe that they’ll be full rotation in the defence from last Saturday to-both give Ruben a much-needed rest and to stretch the legs of those who haven’t played for a week or so and, therefore, I’m going for a back-4 of Oleksandr, Nathan, John & Kyle.
Rodders gets the defensive midfield role and just ahead of him - and just like my predicted defence - I can see a completely different attacking midfield department with Phil, Ilkay, Bernardo & Riyad all being asked to try 'n' provide the assists / goals in this encounter.
Will we go with a striker tonight? There’s a chance we may not but I’m going for our manager to give Gabriel another go ‘up top’.
Zack is the reserve keeper, I would think; Joao, Benjamin, Ruben, Eric & Aymeric make up the rather large contingent of replacement defenders from the side. Fernandinho – another player who has played in defence – Raheem & Ferran make up the rest of ‘the 9’.
Do you know what that bench says to me…it says that when we have just 2-key, attacking players unavailable and all other first-teamers are fit; we do seem, oddly, to be lacking in the attacking / creative department and, therefore, resort to filling most of bench with defenders; short of dipping into the EDS for a midfielder / winger / striker. I’ll be talking more on that in a close-season piece that I have swirling around in my ‘ead…
Notable absences:
- Kevin De Bruyne – Injured with a foot / ankle issue. However, due to chatter about another matter in the pre-match press conference, there has been no update from Pep as yet as to how long our creative mastermind will be out for. Hopefully they’ll be an update soon after dust has settled over a certain football-related story.
- Sergio Aguero – Similarly, no update from the last one we received, which was that he was still suffering with “niggles” and, so, I’m just gonna assume that although he may have made some progress; this game comes too soon for the Argentine. It’s hard to get my head around the fact that as we approach May, Serg has only played just over 6 hours of football!
Do I agree with Pep’s (predicted) line-up?
Result? Our hosts are having a strange season. They started off so very well but then tailed right off as the season progressed. I think it perfectly sums ‘em up that they sit in mid-table having lost almost as many as they’ve won.
Even Sheffield United managed a 1-0 home win against The Lions at the beginning of last month, just to add to the weirdness of their season so far.
Want more ‘Twilight Zone’ material about the Midlands side? Okay…so they’ve played one or two less games than most teams around ‘em but I don’t recall ever seeing a side sitting in (or around) 11th place whilst, at the same time, having the 3rd-best defensive record in the division. Teams just either side of them in the table have conceded 8 & 17 more than the ‘claret & blues’!
So, we’re facing a team with a good defence and a very much in-form & respected goalkeeper, in Emiliano Martinez; a much-travelled / loaned-out stopper who seems to have found stable ground at Villa Park since his £20M summer move.
I’ve said it before recently and with good reason – we’ll need both our decision-making heads & shooting boots on tonight.
Having looked at their defensive record and keeper’s form, I think it should be some cause for concern that in our last 4 domestic games we’ve “only” managed 5 goals. Why? Well…we’re better than that, putting it bluntly.
When we’re in ‘slipstream mode’ we seem to make goal-scoring look as natural as breathing but when we hit one of those periods where it looks like some of the players have blurry vision, it looks like their taking their first ever breath; with passes going astray and shots flying anywhere but ‘between the sticks’.
I think, despite expected personnel changes, we might start this one a little shakily and if we do, Villa also have attacking players who can ‘punish with ease’ (not just him but I do like the look of versatile forward, Ollie Watkins).
But it’s not like us, this season at least, to have back-to-back defeats and I’m sure they’ll be a collective desire from our lads to both get the last game out of their systems and take another step towards Premier League glory.
It could be an interesting game and perhaps even a close one but I’m going for a City win in the end.
Last season’s, corresponding pre-match prediction and result…
Prediction: Win
Result: Won
(Pre-match blog posting from that game)
Has there been anything else happening in football this week effecting our club that needs mention?
Can’t think of anything…
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