Manchester City – Quiet, clam and discipline not on the market
By David, BettingExpert.com | Published
Unfortunately for Mancini and City fans, a good atmosphere in which to work well and build a competent squad focused on what the manager wants to convey is not something you can buy. All the ingredients are there to do well but still no big team mentality like the one Mancini envies so much at the winning neighbours’ household.
Manager: Mancini
Tactics: 4-2-3-1
Players In: Aguero, Clichy, Savic, Pantilimon
Players Out: Vieira, Boateng, Jo, Garrido, Given, Michael Johnson, Caicedo
Current Probable Formation: Hart, M. Richards, K. Toure, Kompany, Kolarov, de Jong, G. Barry, Aguero, Y. Toure, Silva, Dzeko
Mancini has managed to set in place a good defensive mechanism for the team. His is a physically strong team which knows how to move around and block spaces. Unless of course they meet up with a top team like Manchester United, possessing greater fighting spirit, more confidence and undoubtedly better passing play and maneuvers in attack.
Those are basically the next points to tackle by Mancini. He has really been trying to impart those lessons to the group but his lads will often not listen. The atmosphere at the club has not been most favourable for him to work well enough. In part, that may be due to his choice of bringing on board Balotelli, thinking that he could take advantage of his unrest at Inter last summer. The Italian striker packed and left for Manchester promising that he would be a changed man …or at least a man. Only few weeks passed before he went back to his childish behaviour and has since not looked back. He may be a good boy after all and greatly talented but he has far too many flaws in his character. His arrogance, short fuse, bad temper and tendency to get into trouble both in and out of the pitch make him the most destabilizing element in Mancini’s squad.
To all of this the Italian manager has to add the frequent bust-ups between his players in training and most of all Tevez’ reiterated desire to leave the club. Mancini may have played it cool so far saying that the team will not be missing him but the truth is that Tevez has often been the savior for a team which creates few chances in front of goal and has even fewer true goal scoring opportunities.
Perhaps the manager may be thinking he can now rely on new signing Aguero. Maradona’s son in law comes from a very different league. One of the least physical in Europe. His technique may serve him well but even Robinho’s classy touch had often been overshadowed by powerful English defenders and menacing midfielders. Whatever the end result may be he will surely need time to adapt, a lot of it probably.
Players are plentiful for most of the positions on the pitch but there is no capable playmaker aside from Yaya Toure. Right after Tevez he was the player who was most indispensable for Mancini, tying up loose ends as he connected the midfield to the attack. If he is forced to retract too much in midfield the two wide men, Silva and Balotelli, or their reserves Milner, Adam Johnson and Wright-Phillips, will become redundant as they would not get the balls they require to make an impact on the game.
What Manchester City are missing is a true playmaker – one such as Sneijder – who can take that place behind the strikers. That would allow Yaya Toure to fall back in central midfield where he used to play for Barcelona. Alongside him would be de Jong to help provide additional muscle.
The backline is already a solid lot which have learned how to move as a unit from their manager. Kompany, Lescott and Kolo Toure are top level central defenders. Clichy and Kolarov are just as valid in left-back. In fact it is quite pointless to have both those players for just one place. I would suspect that Mancini may be tempted to try and turn one of them into a right-back, although I doubt how much that would work. However, Richards’ inability at securing that side of defence may push Mancini to rethink this option over.
Predicted finishing position: 5th
Well it’s all there laid out in front of Mancini’s eyes. It is a big puzzle though, and one which he may not be able to put together in time. If Tevez gets his way City will be losing out on their best player for the past seasons. Aguero will need time to adapt to the English game making goals a real problem for the club. Their defenders are very capable though and the defensive mechanisms are often quite good as well against all teams other than the big guns. I would expect them to lose out on their chance of winning the title due to way too many scoreless draws, accompanied by general unrest in the squad.
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