Pizy

Even with our full compliment of players fit like Chilly and RJ we don’t have the capability to rattle off 10, 12, 15 league wins in a row like City have done for multiple seasons now. That’s the difference. It requires damn near perfection to finish above them now because they’re capable of insane midseason winning streaks. Even at our fittest and best we were still capable of dropping silly points to shit teams multiple times. Unless we bin Lukaku and sign Haaland we will also have no chance of winning the league next season either. And god knows that ain’t happening. Haaland will probably end up on City and make the league even more of a piss take for them.

We aren’t near City’s level and won’t be for the foreseeable future in the league. Our best chance for major silverware as long as Pep is at City is the CL. Our only job from here on out is to keep the chasing pack at arms length. It was foolish to even think we had a chance today and this result shouldn’t be a huge setback for the players’ mentality. All about beating those behind us and hoping the likes of Arse, United, WH beat each other up.

Just look at us here, man. It’s as though we forgot how to play football. We can’t do ANYTHING right.

Azpi and Alonso just getting roasted for pace over and over and over and over. As predicted.

Also it must be pointed out, Arse played City a couple of weeks ago with zero fear and showed them no respect. Their team of kids showed more quality and courage than our team of super experienced veterans and CL winners. I realize it’s hard to be confident and courageous when we have Alonso, Azpi, Sarr etc out there but still.

Lukaku had a few really poor touches, true, but I don’t see why anyone here is having a go at him here. He’s making the runs and as the commentator Lee Dixon on the American broadcast has said repeatedly the ball doesn’t come accurately. He’s in acres of grass but our players aren’t composed enough to find him. Any striker would be invisible the way we played there.

Sarr is not even PL standard, never mind Chelsea starter standard. Looks like a terrified under 18 youth player out here. Panics when defending, late on every challenge, and petrified to play a forward pass because he knows he’ll misplace it. A point here would be a miracle.

Both clubs with massively expensive squads filled with top players but it’s straight up frightening how MASSIVE the gap is between them when it comes to comfort and composure on the ball. City just effortlessly stroke it around and EVERY SINGLE PLAYER on the pitch for them is ultra good on the ball. Conversely, our super expensive footballers look petrified whenever they get the ball. We can’t string together 3 passes against City for now the second league match in a row. All City have to do is get in our faces and they basically snatch the ball back every time like a school bully picking on a nerd. And they’re doing so with a bunch of tiny dwarf sized players. It’s embarrassing how much better they are than us.

Sarr is doing as poorly as I predicted. He is not good enough for this level. Too slow in thought.

Alonso, man… This is depressing. WE NEED A FUCKING LWB ASAP.

City players know ONCE AGAIN that if they press us all over the pitch we struggle. We can’t handle being man for man pressed.

From a compete stand still Alonso gets fucking destroyed. This is going to be ugly on the left side of our team today.

I am a bit surprised that he started. Well actually, I’m surprised he started him as the lone striker. Since Kai rested against Spuds I figured he was planning to start Havertz and Rom up top together. City probably wouldn’t have expected that.

Tuchel himself acknowledged yesterday that he got his tactics wrong the last time we played them. We went too defensive and passive and were dominated. So I’d expect us to do what Arse did to them a couple of weeks ago and take them head on. Unfortunately, I’m not sure how well that’s going to work with the fullbacks we have. Think it’s wise J5 isn’t starting here. Kante + Kova will hopefully have the aggression to cause serious issues with City’s intricate passing. Very nervous about Sarr, Azpi, and Alonso. 😬😬😬

The easiest of our CB’s to replace from a skill set POV, though it will suck that we won’t get top dollar for him (any dollars, actually) due to his contract situation. It’ll basically cost 50-60 million to replace him with Koundé. With Silva confirmed to be back next season, it’s much more important to lock down Rüdiger than it is AC. Literally ANY one of Süle, Koundé, or Ginter is a pretty substantial upgrade on AC.

As I said yesterday, Kenedy is a shit player. Completely failed to make an impact at any of the clubs he’s been loaned to and those were nowhere remotely close to our level. It would be an absolute joke if a club of our stature couldn’t find anyone better this month even if it’s just a loan for someone like Dest.

Christensen out with COVID now. So it’s either we continue with a back 4 that includes Sarr or we play Azpi as the 3rd CB in a back 3. Think I’d prefer the latter as Sarr looks a bit shaky on the ball when he’s pressed. And god knows City will press the shit out of him.

Can we extend AFCON another month? 😂 Liverpool are shite without Salah & Mané.

You’d imagine he’d be an undisputed starter if he moved there which he won’t be here. That’s what’s enticing to AC.

Rare to see a player in his prime moving down a level of this is true. I guess it makes sense for him since he was in Germany before and will be a considered much more important there than he is here. Things are sounding more positive with Rüdiger and he is much more important to keep. Christensen out, Koundé in to replace him, and Toni staying would be an excellent outcome for us. And a definite upgrade.

I’m still scarred from the game earlier this season when they played us off the park and made us look like Chesterfield. 😅😅😅

Spuds were dogshit tonight so it didn’t matter, but City will be licking their chops watching that. I pray that it’s because we just went into cruise control after the goal and weren’t as focused since we knew we were through. Because the number of times they were clean through the middle barreling towards our goal is concerning. Kane looks like he’s lost several yards of pace so he couldn’t sprint away from our defenders consistently. If Son were playing today I think they’d have scored on a couple of those breakaways. And City this weekend will be much less wasteful.

You would hope that when we switch back to more high stakes PL matches these lazy mistakes will be less frequent. Some of our players just looked bored and tried to be too cute with the ball.

Completely dominant and comfortable for 95% of that half but literally every single dangerous moment Spuds had was self induced. So many sloppy, lazy passes from defenders and midfielders. City will ruthlessly punish us for those.

The Spuds team is straight up trash. Unless we are sleepwalking and acting unprofessional (“we’re 2-0 up and already through) we should be winning this comfortably. The pace of Lucas and the finishing of Kane are dangers, but we can negate most of that by keeping the ball away from them like we did the first leg.