Manchester City v Aston Villa Weds 3rd April | Page 23 | Vital Football

Manchester City v Aston Villa Weds 3rd April

MrLoverLover said:
Emery got it wrong, horrendous lineup, horrendous subs, he’s got credit in the bank of course but that was what you’d expect from a Smith or Gerrard team.

I expected nothing even with a strong team but we must beat Brentford, if we don’t then you question if Emery is losing it. That team selection tonight was abysmal and the writing was on the wall before kickoff. Bringing chambers on was insanity, one of the worst players I’ve ever seen on a football pitch.
Click to expand...
Emery's clearly picking his battles with a depleted squad and I think the first half performance shows that he got his tactics and decisions pretty right in possibly the hardest fixture in the calendar. No Martinez, McGinn, Kamara or Watkins at Man City means that aiming to control possession would be a forlorn hope, so he set us up to counter and we looked dangerous doing that. The free kick before half-time made his mind up to cut our losses and in a way I admire that hard-nosed decisiveness.

This is a marathon, not a sprint.
 
JNB90 said:
The alternative is to bust your balls tonight, knackering everyone out and still probably lose the game….to then be shattered for a winnable game vs Brentford, and then end losing that too because …..well, we’re all shattered.
Click to expand...
Sure, if we beat Brentford all will be forgotten. But my belief is you try to win every game you can. We were never winning that game tonight with that lineup.
 
JNB90 said:
The alternative is to bust your balls tonight, knackering everyone out and still probably lose the game….to then be shattered for a winnable game vs Brentford, and then end losing that too because …..well, we’re all shattered.
Click to expand...
Fair point. Let’s hope we beat Brentford then or the strategy failed.
 
Totally don't blame Emery for the selection . Injuries have screwed us but haven't !!!...when you consider where we are now is more than we could probably imagine . I would have loved to have seen us with a full complement as much as possible. The mind boggles tbh that we have had key players missing for so long.


Emery is a genius. Absolute genius.
 
mike_field said:
Thing is though, small margins. If Dougie buries his chance in the bottom corner and doesn't hit it mid-goal easy head height - yes it's a could've - but it could've been different.

City were not comfortable when we pushed, our problem was we didn't do it enough, nor take advantage of when we did.
Click to expand...
Yeah, we had to be at our best and take all our good chances (and still have some luck at the other end). Definitely some nice passages of play from ourselves, but with so many out from the regular line up, we looked a little disjointed at times. Unai will have learnt a lot about his players and from that perspective it was a good exercise.

On another day Foden would have missed, them's the breaks and we got what we got on the day/night. We've come a long way from "resigned to defeat" to "pissed off we lost" and it will unfortunately take us about 3-5 years to be fully competitive at the very top level all the time. Finances are going to be crucial this summer.
 
Platypus said:
I have to say, on the evidence of last night, that Phil Foden is indeed "World Class". Insane how poorly Beaky deploys him for England.
Click to expand...
Yep said the same to junior at the game last night….though I did jinx it by saying on 45 minutes that we’d done well to keep him so quiet… :clown:
 
Pangloss said:
Probably by 25 he will be one of the very best if not the best in his position. I don't like him or City but you can't deny his talent.
Click to expand...
Everything worked in his favour last night but he shouldn't be judged on that performance alone. To me, he's still got a lot to do to be classed in the category of Mbappe, Messi, Ronaldo (true world class players).

He's very good and I have no doubt that all the super rich clubs would all take him in a heartbeat, but world class is another level IMHO, a game changer if you will and I don't think I've seen him that from him yet.

It's all well and good to say Southgate doesn't know how to play him, but Messi would still have shone in an England set up.
 
Merd said:
Everything worked in his favour last night but he shouldn't be judged on that performance alone. To me, he's still got a lot to do to be classed in the category of Mbappe, Messi, Ronaldo (true world class players).

He's very good and I have no doubt that all the super rich clubs would all take him in a heartbeat, but world class is another level IMHO, a game changer if you will and I don't think I've seen him that from him yet.

It's all well and good to say Southgate doesn't know how to play him, but Messi would still have shone in an England set up.
Click to expand...
The thing is, Messi and Ronaldo are finished, so the standard as to what is world class has dropped now.

Also, if I think of the best attacking midfielders in the world right now I'm struggling to name 5 better than Foden. Bellingham and De Bruyne are the real standouts. Who the rest that you would say are better than Foden?

Mbappe is in a different position so I wouldn't compare to Foden.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.