Chelsea interfere in the champ race, breaking Man City’s streak of six consecutive wins. And that’s just in the EPL, with 11 in total. Guardiola’s team loses the leadership in terms of lost points — even in the case of victory over Brentford in the postponed match, which will be held on Thursday, can only go to second place, ahead of Arsenal. To surpass Liverpool is not yet possible.
The main story for Saturday’s match at the Etihad is Manchester City’s open center of the pitch. Pep once admitted that he dreams of fielding a team made up entirely of midfielders. Ilkay Gundogan later relayed details of a private conversation in which Guardiola explained his motives. According to the German, Pep considers midfielders as those who see the game five steps ahead.
The game against Chelsea is the maximum distance from the fulfillment of a dream. In the starting lineup of City from the midfielders is listed only Rodri. He is backed up by four defenders at the back and an attacking five consisting of Foden, De Bruyne, Haaland, Alvarez and Doku up front. A fit Chelsea are punished for this.
Rodri is not left to fend for himself. But he is paired with either a central defender or a forward.
It is worth considering some realities to understand why Guardiola has to give up on his dream. The fact is that before the match there are doubts about all four of Rodri’s teammates for the season.
- Bernardo heals a bruise after the game against Copenhagen. As a result, he is included in the squad, but only takes to the pitch in the second half.
- John Stones is apparently unable to play two matches a week after an injury. He was given a break after the trip to Denmark.
- Mateo Kovacic has only recently returned to training — he last started at the end of January. Here he is only on the bench. John Stones is apparently unable to play two matches a week after an injury. He was given a break after the trip to Denmark.
- Mateus Nunes is healthy, but Pep doesn’t trust him in top matches yet. The opponents against whom the Portuguese starts are Red Star, Nottingham Forest, Wolves, Young Boys, Urawa Red Diamonds, Everton, Huddersfield and Burnley. Quite telling.
Despite this list of losses, Rodri still finds partners in the midfield. They are just not midfielders at all. Either getting used to new roles or having to patch up holes and do things they aren’t taught as kids.
When the ball is played to Rodri, Manuel Akanji comes up from the center of the defense — just like Stones did last season. From time to time, the Swiss substitutes for his partner. The match against Chelsea is another test.
The trouble is that Akanji is still too far from the peak version of Stones. After the recent match against Everton, Guardiola admits that Manu is uncomfortable in a hybrid role. One of the reasons is that the Swiss is not yet able to receive balls half-turned and with an already prepared solution. Stones calls this the biggest challenge he faces.
In the first half, Akanji’s slowness takes a beating in advancing the ball. The contrast with Rodri is characteristic: before the break, only 37% of Manu’s passes go forward, Rodri’s figure is 59%. This partly explains why the Citizens use only one flank in their attacks. The left flank, which is close to Rodri, receives 45% of their passes, while the right flank, which is close to Akanji, receives only 28%.
Another problem is Manu’s reaction to losses. A difficult dilemma for a player in his role — you have to decide whether to stay with Rodri in midfield or run to his place in defense. Sometimes Akanji fails and gets stuck in a half position, sometimes he is slow to react. Chelsea take advantage of this on the counter-attack.
Rodri finds a second partner in episodes when City have to defend. In theory, De Bruyne could be next to the Spaniard, but the Belgian is obviously at this stage of his career. Without the ball, Kevin is on the same line as Erling Holand. Julian Alvarez goes down to Rodri.
The World Cup showed that the Argentine is willing to plow through. Never shies away from work and is even capable of giving double volume if the main star needs to be offloaded. The trouble is that Julian has never played as a support player. It requires completely different qualities than pressing the opponent, which is what Alvarez is so good at.
The problems are of two types. First, sometimes Julian simply doesn’t have time to get back from offense (his role with the ball) to support (his role without the ball). Rodri is left on his own.
The Spaniard is forced to patrol a huge space while Alvarez is just trying to get back into his own half.
Even when Julian manages and returns, Chelsea trash his defensive qualities. Cole Palmer in particular gets harassed often. The Englishman either passes into the open midfield or beats Alvarez one-on-one, then finds Gusto with a pass. To do this, he specifically shifts from his right side to the center.
In total, Chelsea players give up four assists in a row. For Manchester City, it’s a repeat of the season’s anti-record, with as many happening in only three matches. This is a good indication of the difficulties the hosts face. City’s defense is too often the victim of a bare backline.
In theory, this attacking fill-in could help City on the counter-attack. There are five quick players up front, including the Kevin De Bruyne-Holand link-up. Compared to a normal match, the hosts have even too many fast breakaways.
The problem is that they either don’t make it to the kick or execute it poorly. The exchange “threat in counterattacks at the cost of loss of density in midfield” is not justified.
Pochettino is copying Terzic’s method. It’s becoming Chelsea’s counter-attacking weapon.
Against teams with four defenders, Pep traditionally overloads the last line. This time he doesn’t even have to invent anything special. The five lines up by themselves: Doku — Alvarez — Haaland — KdB — Foden.
How do opposing coaches counter this? Usually three options:
- continue to play with the back four, but so tight that City don’t have time to use an extra player in attack;
- reorganize to five defenders so that City don’t have an extra by default;
- switch to five defenders situationally — a mix of believing in their own soccer and adapting to City.
The adept of the latter option is Edin Terzic. Dortmund’s coach is using him in a great way against City in the Champions League. It’s happened four times now. Pochettino decides to copy some of Terzic’s principles.
In the preparatory phase of the home team’s attacks, Chelsea use the usual scheme with four defenders, and in the final phase they regularly change to five. The defenders are either supported by Caicedo and Enzo, or Palmer, who helps Gusto with Doku’s containment.
With this technique, Chelsea do a good job of containing City’s attacking power in the first hour of the game. Firstly, City hardly ever put an attacking player in space — he is blocked by his opponents. Secondly, Doku almost never finds himself one-on-one with Gusteau, and Chelsea’s right-back always has a backup. Jérémie still tries a lot (11 dribbling attempts), but his efficiency leaves much to be desired (only three tackles per match).
Moreover, Pochettino/Terzic’s reception becomes Chelsea’s starting point for their own counterattacks. Depriving Manchester City of their usual trump cards, the visitors force the hosts to make unprepared decisions. They lead to losses, which Chelsea transform into counter-attacks. Because of City’s problems in the backline, they are much easier to create.
Perhaps the counterattacks only stop after Pochettino’s substitutions. In the middle of the second half, Mauricio kills Palmer, through whom there is communication, and releases Trevo Chalobah.
Chelsea’s defense is now five not situational, but constant. Given the scoreline and the risks City have started to take, you can understand Pochettino’s logic. At the same time, Chelsea stop running out on the breakaways at all and can’t catch a break after another wave of attack from the hosts.
The formula for City’s camber is Haaland’s crosses and Rodri’s legendary connections
Despite Pochettino’s preparation, City still create plenty of chances. We can argue about their quality for a long time, but in the second half City finally clamped down on Chelsea. 31 shots in total is a powerful display.
In response to Pochettino’s move, Guardiola finds two solutions.
Firstly, crosses to Haaland. There are an incredible number of them being passed by City standards. 47 to be precise. The absolute best record of the season. The previous was 35 against Sheffield United.
Haaland himself is curiously adapting to his role as the match progresses. Right during the game he begins to realize that there is nothing to catch against Axel Disassi: the Frenchman is excellent in aerial duels and in general in the air (16 clearances from the penalty box!). But against Colville and Chilwell, the Norwegian can go wild. Either he shoots himself, or he puts the shutters down and one of his partners takes the ball.
Secondly, the connections to the attack of Rodri and Walker. It is especially interesting to follow the Spaniard’s thinking. He usually practices spurts into the backline, when Caicedo or Enzo sit down as the fifth defender and, as a consequence, leave the rebound free. That’s where the Cityzens‘ leader seeps in.
The hosts’ best chances after the break come from a combination of all three factors (crosses to Haaland + Walker’s connections + Rodri’s openings in the backline).
The goal comes when all three factors work directly. Haaland blocks Chilwell during a cross. Walker finds himself free at the far post. And Rodri is left unguarded in the backline.
By scoring against Chelsea, the Spaniard brings the number of goals this season to six. At this rate, Rodri looks set to break his personal record (seven so far) before the end of the campaign. Certainly deserves compliments, but perhaps City wouldn’t have had to resort to Rodri’s help and heroics at all if he had been supported in midfield.
He doesn’t appear to have a decent partner this time around and Chelsea are taking advantage of that