Result ≠ performance.If we were really that awful and took an away point from the strongest team in the country, then I'll settle for awful every week.
Result ≠ performance.
Yes.Did poor lo celso even touch the ball?
We weren't great.. We rode our luck.......... But embarresment??? You taking the piss?Love VAR!!
On a serious note, it was an embarrassment, the game that is. We were lucky to get a point.
Players were all bad but will give it to Lamela for his goal and assist.
Thought Kane & Eriksen were really poor. I know it’s a tough game and they had little to work with, but that is when you need your ‘world class’ players to stand up and make sure when they do get the ball they do something. And when I say something I am not talking scoring a worldy, I would settle for keeping possession and making the right decision.
Delighted with a point but would have hoped to shown more quality.
Harsh assessment of Ndombele, hes 22 and that is the hardest fixture he will play all season. Give him a break!Formation - 0
VAR - 10
Manchester City - 9
Lloris: without him we lose this match. Neither goal in any way his fault and yes, a few of his passes were poor but he made one world class save and was very steady on everything else that came at him, of which there was a lot.
Walker - Peters: up against a player who is making mincemeat of most defenders at the moment, he played well in my opinion. Was robbed by Sterling once, I think with the goal you give Sterling credit for an incredible run, and going forward Walker_peters actually showed a fair bit of confidence and technique. Passable and did better against Sterling than more fullbacks will.
Alderweireld: poor in distribution, seemed a bit static defensively and between him and Sanchez I felt that the lack of attention given to Aguero for his goal was shoddy at best.
Sanchez: like Alderweireld, I felt he was poor on the Aguero goal, but otherwise he played well, cut out a lot and was the defender standing up to the barrage every time.
Rose: best way to sum up his performance is to point out that both City goals, and the majority of other City chances, came from our left hand side. I'll add that a poor defensive full back is easier to take if going forward you're getting huge amounts of product, but that's not the case here. Gumption and moxy can only get you so far.
Sissoko: seemed to be his job to protect Walker-Peters, he didn't. Seemed to be his job to transition, he didn't. Then he was put on the wing (at which point surely just bring on Lucas for him), which highlighted his deficiencies and dulled his plus points. another 16/17 Sissoko performance I'm afraid.
Ndombele: not helped by being played as our defensive midfielder, but ever with that in mind he just wasn't in the game and was seriously gassing in the final half hour. Pace of the game completely caught him out and City ran rings around him. On the barometer of Paulinho - Modric, he's far closer to our old number 8 I'm afraid.
Winks: tried to do something with the ball and also made himself available to take it, but none of his good intention was matched by execution. Left Rose exposed too (he seemed to be the left sided midfielder) and lacked any real composure or imagination when he did have possession.
Lamela: a goal and an assist makes his performance sound better than it was. He wasn't bad, and he was our most likely player to make anything happen with his occasional drives, but his most promising situations were undone by indecision and poor execution.
Eriksen: off the ball was one of our better players, but on the ball he just wasn't at it, too slow to get the ball out of his feet and didn't manage to create a stitch.
Kane: while he has the slight excuse of being the striker in a match where we created nothing (literally), he has to do more to help out the side when we're that under the cosh. He just wasn't an out ball today, there was no hold up play and he wasn't running the channels.
Lucas: came on, won us a point, pressed well and went on a couple of eye pleasing runs.
Lo Celso and Skipp: had no effect whatsoever.
A lot of scathing criticism above, but I caveat it all with condemnation of a formation and selection which played to none of our strengths and all of City's. The fullbacks were given no protection, there were three central midfielders who were all trying to do the same thing (and all failing at it), there was no variation in our (rare) attacking play and our best player was left isolated. Christmas tree, diamond, whatever, it doesn't work. With Son returning and Lo Celso getting another week of training, I really hope to see something resembling ambition in next week's line up. I will also caveat this criticism by saying that even if we had gone with another formation, it might not have worked anyway. Today Manchester City steamroll every side in this league in terms of possession, attacking impact and eye catching football, they were absolutely superb, and the only way any selection we put out was getting a result was with a bit of fortune, a bit of character and a bit of opportunism, all three of which we did show.
Apparently he's that good he doesn't need to.Did poor lo celso even touch the ball?
Amended to say ‘today’ he’s far closer. I didn’t mean I think that he’s a Paulinho, I certainly don’t, I just meant that today’s lack of involvement and being passed by reminded me of Paulinho.Harsh assessment of Ndombele, hes 22 and that is the hardest fixture he will play all season. Give him a break!
How was Modric after 2 games?
Um... red boots...Lo Celso. Made no mistakes at all