Race for the Top 4 - 2017/18

Dov67 · Oct 2, 2017

City look superb, Man U look ruthless and efficient. We are gathering pace as we tend to do. Ali hasn't hit form yet, Dembele is out, as is Wanyama and Rose and Lamela (remember him). We could just as easily have taken 7 or 9 points at "home" instead of 2, such are the fine lines in this League.

as good as Man U and the Oil Money Club have been, they haven't played us yet.

Chill everyone.....its still only October, not April.

guiltyparty · Oct 2, 2017

bubble07 said:
Lets not forgot we have also had a kind set of fixtures so far. The only difficult one we lost

Utd have had a much easier start

West Ham (15th)
Swansea (18th)
Leicester (17th)
Stoke (13th)
Everton (16th)
Southampton (12th)
Palace (20th)

Haven't played a team currently in top half

Ours...

Newcastle (9th)
Chelsea (4th)
Burnley (6th)
Everton (16th)
Swansea (18th)
West Ham (15th)
Huddersfield (11th)

I would say ours is very similar to City's...

Brighton (14th)
Everton (16th)
Bournemouth (19th)
Liverpool (7th)
Watford (8th)
Palace (20th)
Chelsea (4th)

Whereas Chelsea have clearly had the hardest start...

Burnley (6th)
Tottenham (3rd)
Everton (16th)
Leicester (17th)
Arsenal (5th)
Stoke (13th)
Man city (1st)

hellava_tough · Oct 2, 2017

So iirc, Man City won their first 10 games last season before falling away.

I'm not sure why that was (anyone?), but the season is a long and grueling one and players have to stay focused, and interested. There will be periods where a team just has to go through the motions and grind out victories; it's those games where the league is won or lost.

If City do have a weakness, it may be with their mental strength come December, January and February.

As for us, I think we are one of the strongest mentally in the league; it's just our lack of creativity from time to time, against the 'bus-parkers' that lets us down.

Hazelton · Oct 2, 2017

How the fuck can we be a "one man team" when that one man didn't score during the whole of August and we still did alright?

aliyid · Oct 2, 2017

hellava_tough said:
So iirc, Man City won their first 10 games last season before falling away.

I'm not sure why that was (anyone?)

Could be many things but they were flying high on confidence and belief in their new manager (Pep) last year until we turned them over and people started asking questions, the weather started getting a bit grimmer and Champions league / cup games properly kicked it without any sign of player rotation.

I think Pep will rotate more this year but I'm not sure if they're a team that can dig in and grind out the scrappy matches.

Shadydan · Oct 2, 2017

bubble07 said:
Because he now views us as a genuine threat

Like last season..

hellava_tough · Oct 2, 2017

aliyid said:
Could be many things but they were flying high on confidence and belief in their new manager (Pep) last year until we turned them over and people started asking questions, the weather started getting a bit grimmer and Champions league / cup games properly kicked it without any sign of player rotation.

I think Pep will rotate more this year but I'm not sure if they're a team that can dig in and grind out the scrappy matches.

In many respects Utd are better at this, despite having less natural talent in their squad

sak11 · Oct 2, 2017

Shadydan said:
Don't think he meant that to be mean, he's just trying to make a point about Kane to say how good he is, every time he's spoken about us he's praised us so don't see why he'd change his time now.

It pretty bloody disrespectful to the club as a whole. We have a proper team. Harry is an essential part of it. But the success is not just down to him. Back in AVB times we were the Bale team for sure. As important as Harry is, he isn't our only threat. We have quality all over the park. Shit comment by guardiola.

dontcallme · Oct 2, 2017

Joys of the internet, one sentence given hundreds of meanings and discussed and as always the end result was it was either offensive or disrespectful.

Has anyone got what Guardiola said in full?

SUIYHA · Oct 2, 2017

http://www.skysports.com/football/n...alongside-chelsea-and-man-utd-as-title-rivals

"It's in September, so Chelsea won 15 games in a row last season, were unbeatable and won the league, not easy, but they won it in advance," Guardiola said after City's win.

"Of course this season has a little more problems because they [Chelsea] play every three days, that's always more complicated for all the teams.

"But we also have United, we saw again the Harry Kane team scores every day two or three goals."

Pep's a smart guy, he knows what he was doing with that comment. He's trying to paint us as a "one-man team" and create a narrative that Kane is too good for us and should be looking for a transfer. I think we should remind Pep about the results that "the Harry Kane team" had without Harry Kane last season:

Middlesbrough 1-2 Spurs
Spurs 2-0 Pep's Man City
West Brom 1-1 Spurs
Bournemouth 0-0 Spurs
Spurs 1-1 Leicester
Spurs 2-1 Southampton
Burnley 0-2 Spurs
Swansea 1-3 Spurs
Spurs 4-0 Watford

WWDDDWWWW - that's 2.33 PPG. Pep's total PPG at Man City is 2.16. Methinks someone needs to pipe the fuck down.

We have had the best defence in the league in the last two seasons. We had last seasons top assister in the league and we were the only team in the league that had three different players reach the 20 goal mark last season. Kane is a good player but he's not our only good player

Roynie · Oct 2, 2017

Hazelton said:
How the fuck can we be a "one man team" when that one man didn't score during the whole of August and we still did alright?

I'm not so sure that 4 points out of 9 is alright if we hope to have any chance of the title.

Chelsea - well OK they are the champions but at home we should have got a draw, and we should have beaten Burnley. That said we are only 7 games in and are 3rd. We certainly need to sort out our home form though.

aliyid · Oct 2, 2017

Funniest thing about the one man team comment is that it's simply not true, if we take a look at top GS last season from both teams:

Kane - 29
Aguero - 20
Alli - 18
Son - 14
Eriksen - 8
Jesus - 7

Quite clearly shows we have more outlets than they do/did so no need for people to panic about it (y)

King of Otters · Oct 2, 2017

I'll give him the benefit of the doubt and assume he meant to pay Kane a compliment rather than belittle/undermine us.

He's been nothing but complimentary about Spurs in the past, and while not above playing mind games, he doesn't seem to be quite such a pathological bell end as the likes of Mourinho.

coys200 · Oct 2, 2017

United have had a ridiculously easy start,it’s impossible to judge them.Mendy And aguero are big losses for city they don’t have like for like.They could almost afford to lose one of silva x2 Sterling de Bruyne they are all so similar.Also didn’t realise their only recognised DM Fernandinho is 32.Still think city squad is very unbalanced.Their pace will unquestionably drop off.Whether that will be enough for us to mount a serious challenge who can say.

rossdapep · Oct 2, 2017

coys200 said:
United have had a ridiculously easy start,it’s impossible to judge them.Mendy And aguero are big losses for city they don’t have like for like.They could almost afford to lose one of silva x2 Sterling de Bruyne they are all so similar.Also didn’t realise their only recognised DM Fernandinho is 32.Still think city squad is very unbalanced.Their pace will unquestionably drop off.Whether that will be enough for us to mount a serious challenge who can say.

If they lose Fernandinho that could be a huge blow for them. Gundogan hasn't shown that he is over his injuries yet so they may have a huge gap there. Their weakness last season was the full backs and the CBs being exposed. Mendy being out is a huge blow, if Walker was unable to maintain his form or get injured they could have similar issues to last year. I suppose that is all down to ifs and buts, although it's good to know there are weaknesses there.

thekneaf · Oct 2, 2017

rossdapep said:
If they lose Fernandinho that could be a huge blow for them. Gundogan hasn't shown that he is over his injuries yet so they may have a huge gap there. Their weakness last season was the full backs and the CBs being exposed. Mendy being out is a huge blow, if Walker was unable to maintain his form or get injured they could have similar issues to last year. I suppose that is all down to ifs and buts, although it's good to know there are weaknesses there.

Given our concerns over Walker playing too regularly and his injury record prior to Poch joining, I have Walker pegged for a medium term muscle injury this season if Pep keeps hammering him up and down the pitch every game as he currently is.

allpaths · Oct 2, 2017

rossdapep said:
If they lose Fernandinho that could be a huge blow for them. Gundogan hasn't shown that he is over his injuries yet so they may have a huge gap there. Their weakness last season was the full backs and the CBs being exposed. Mendy being out is a huge blow, if Walker was unable to maintain his form or get injured they could have similar issues to last year. I suppose that is all down to ifs and buts, although it's good to know there are weaknesses there.

I'm not so sure FBs are going to be a concern at all for city even with mendy out. Delph looks like he's going to pull a victor moses and turn into a very solid fb option and they somehow were able to convince Danilo to swap Madrid's bench for theres, who can cover more than adequetally for both spots. Fernandinho like you said is the key and if the lose him they'd lose so much cover in midfield.

slartibartfast · Oct 2, 2017

Well Alan Shearer said on motd our starting 11 is as good as anybodys but we haven't got much quality in depth.... after our 4.0 win... away from home.... without Wanyama.... oh and Rose who when both fit get in that 11 imo.... oh and Dembele of course mustn't forget him... oh and Son who only scored 20 odd goals last season, forgot him.... and we've Llorente now as well of course... and Lamela should return soon as well... oh and Aurier wasn't playing either was he Alan... hmmm....

So really Alan that comment was utter fkin bollocks wasn't it Alan?
Its ok, you make that many I'm sure no one noticed.

BringBack_leGin · Oct 2, 2017

I still don't understand the whole lack of depth angle.

GK: 1 world class, 1 proven premier league quality, 1 experienced back up.

RB: 2 full internationals in their prime.

LB: 2 full internationals in their prime.

CB: 2 full internationals in their prime, 1 superb young international, a midfielder who can drop into CB seamlessly and a very highly rated, highly coveted young prospect.

CM: 3 top class full internationals, 1 very highly rated young prospect, several international players elsewhere on the pitch who can easily fit in.

AM: 5 premiership proven internationals, some of whom are amongst the best in their position, and another talented young prospect.

CF: worlds best centre forward back up by a World Cup winning striker. And others who can slot in well.

And it's not as if that's just creative squad accounting, we have plenty of bodies in total too:

GK: Lloris Vorm Gazzaniga
RB: Aurier Trippier
CB: Alderweireld Foyth
CB: Vertonghen Sanchez
LB: Davies Rose
CM: Dier Wanyama
CM: Dembele Winks
AM: Eriksen, Dele, Son, Sissoko, Lamela, Nkoudou
FW: Kane, Llorente

The beauty of it is, even though we play 343, we are versed in several formations which allow for different lineups when injuries and suspensions are on the heavy side.

am_yisrael_chai · Oct 2, 2017

BringBack_leGin said:
I still don't understand the whole lack of depth angle.

GK: 1 world class, 1 proven premier league quality, 1 experienced back up.

RB: 2 full internationals in their prime.

LB: 2 full internationals in their prime.

CB: 2 full internationals in their prime, 1 superb young international, a midfielder who can drop into CB seamlessly and a very highly rated, highly coveted young prospect.

CM: 3 top class full internationals, 1 very highly rated young prospect, several international players elsewhere on the pitch who can easily fit in.

AM: 5 premiership proven internationals, some of whom are amongst the best in their position, and another talented young prospect.

CF: worlds best centre forward back up by a World Cup winning striker. And others who can slot in well.

And it's not as if that's just creative squad accounting, we have plenty of bodies in total too:

GK: Lloris Vorm Gazzaniga
RB: Aurier Trippier
CB: Alderweireld Foyth
CB: Vertonghen Sanchez
LB: Davies Rose
CM: Dier Wanyama
CM: Dembele Winks
AM: Eriksen, Dele, Son, Sissoko, Lamela, Nkoudou
FW: Kane, Llorente

The beauty of it is, even though we play 343, we are versed in several formations which allow for different lineups when injuries and suspensions are on the heavy side.

Depth is a really boring term. The goons have lots of depth in their squad and it’s all equally rubbish. As has been said numerous times in the last few windows the only thing we lack is genuine unpredictability upfront in the Hazard, Jesus, Sane, Mane mould.

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