Cast your minds back to August.
Ah, the start of the 2015/16 season, when Jose’s Chelsea
were title contenders, Leicester’s main priority was survival and Brendan
Rodgers was still in the dugout at Anfield. Over at the Etihad, a revitalised
and pumped Vincent Kompany was back to full fitness and ready to lead his
Manchester City team into battle to secure their third Premier League trophy in
five seasons. Rumours had been rife that Manuel Pellegrini was set to be
replaced by Pep Guardiola – something that hadn’t been confirmed nor denied. So
City issued a statement revealing that the Chilean had been offered a two-year
contract extension that would see him stay at the club until June 2017.
Well isn’t that lovely; a contract extension that will stop
everybody from talking and writing about Pep. A strategic move intended to
allow the manager and players to focus solely on winning silverware and to put
a stop to those rumours once and for all. Well done City, very holistic of you.
Well, holistic, naïve or completely pointless.
Five games in and City were flying. With no goals conceded and
some stellar performances, including an awe-inspiring 3-0 thumping of Chelsea,
everything had clicked for the Blues. The defence solid, the midfield full of
creativity and flair and Kun Aguero upfront, no team had come close to looking quite
as impressive and threatening.
‘Sheikh Mansour went to Spain in a Lamborghini,’ bellowed
the home faithful. ‘Brought us back a manager, Manuel Pellegrini.’
I even penned an article about how at this rate, City could have the title sewn up by Christmas.
How wrong I was.
For nobody could have foreseen the seemingly implausible
outstanding season that Leicester have had. Few would have predicted Jose’s
departure from Chelsea and well, okay, more than a few would’ve bet on Rodgers
appearing in more of a pundit role than a managerial one this year.
But nobody would’ve predicted the cataclysmic collapse of
Manchester City. From title favourites to struggling to maintain top four
status in a matter of months, the wheels on the bandwagon have come flying off in
every which way. Injuries aplenty, insulting prices for a Champions League
quarter final home tie and a manager so stubborn it raises even the most
mild-mannered fan’s blood pressure; it’s both an embarrassing and perplexing
end to a season that started with so much expectation and promise.
GREAT EXPECTATIONS
Expectation is a funny thing. The mentality of fans seems to
be two-fold: we plummeted to Division Two 18 years ago so we should just be
grateful that we have had this incredible takeover with world class players at
our club. On the flip side, it’s time to stop living in the past. Winning the FA
Cup, the Premier League, the Capital One Cup and the Community Shield has given
a taste of success most fans could only dream about.
That’s set the standard and left a certain acquired taste in
the mouth. Once you experience your football team winning silverware, it’s
infectious. The personal memories that accompany the triumphs can’t be
underestimated. But success in itself breeds expectation – you only have to
look at United and Liverpool to know that. Fans want more of the same –
anything less is a disappointment. It can offer conflicting emotions – you
don’t want to let go of the past and ‘the journey’, you know you’ll never have
an ‘Aguero’ moment again, but that doesn’t mean you want the team to stop
progressing and trying to win trophy after trophy.
I’m in the conflicted camp. I don’t want the club to become
all corporate and it seems that’s the way it’s heading – targeting the money of
the business client and pricing out the working-class hardcore element of the
fan-base. It was inevitable. It’s understood that fans can’t expect super
signings paying eye-watering wages and state of the art facilities without some
form of increase, but where does it end? It’s dangerous ground when the club
are constantly implementing cheesy gimmicks and marketing ploys to target a lucrative
global audience – alienating and neglecting those 28,000 Maine Road regulars in
the process.
DOCTOR, DOCTOR…
It’s an easy excuse to give, but injuries have taken their
toll. Incurring so many muscle injuries has got to be looked at by the
management and medical staff surely. It’s cost the club no end this season. Kompany,
so influential in the heart of defence, has spent more time recovering than
playing this season. David Silva, Sergio Aguero, Nicholas Otamendi, Joe Hart,
Pablo Zabaleta, Kevin De Bruyne, Raheem Sterling, Wilfried Bony and Samir Nasri
to name a few have all spent time in the physio room, leading to a dramatic
loss of form for some concerned (sadly,
I’m looking at you Spanish Dave).
Sticking with that thought, under-performing has been a
painfully reoccurring theme throughout the season. Sometimes you have to stop
sugar-coating and call a spade a spade. Jesus Navas can run and run and run and
spend all night running, but the chances are he a) won’t beat his man and b)
won’t get a cross in. Maybe c) his shot will go out for a throw in. Bony has
been nothing short of a flop in front of goal; with Kelechi Iheanacho
impressing when given game time, how and why is it that Pellegrini has stuck
with Bony time and time again? It’s indefensible loyalty. Otamendi,
frustratingly inconsistent in defence, has a perchance for a slide tackle,
which more often than not gets his name in the book.
Mega money signing Sterling has been all potential and no
performance, Aleksander Kolarov is akin to a temperamental tortoise (if such a thing should happen to exist)
and let’s not even go there with Martin Demichelis (the betting is not acceptable as a smokescreen). The jury is out on
Fernando and Eliaqium Mangala is a hell of a lot of money to punt with not much
of a result. Bacary Sagna and Gael Clichy have been mediocre – they can perform
on their day, but mediocre doesn’t win you silverware.
If I was Pep I’d be keeping: Aguero (obvious reasons), Silva (I
live in eternal hope that he will find his magic wand again), Hart (England’s number one™), De Bruyne (Belgium’s Frank Lampard), Zabaleta (Mr City) and Fabian Delph (my opinion has changed on him this season).
What about Yaya? The man who splits City fans’ opinions and
causes many an argument on social media: a midfielder who can spend 82 minutes
meandering round the centre of the pitch when City are a goal behind, looking
like he’s walking through sand and thinking about what’s for tea, only to push
forward in a surge of blistering pace and not only score the equaliser, but the
winner too. He’s frustrating because it’s always on his terms; he plays when he
wants to. He doesn’t defend because Yaya ‘doesn’t defend’ and apparently that’s
acceptable. He can look like a petulant child who is being dragged round a
shopping centre on a Bank Holiday, yet as long as he’s on the pitch he’s
capable of producing match-winning moments of brilliance. The politics of Pep,
coupled with his mischievous agent, means a question mark hangs over his future
at the club.
THAT CHARMING MAN
Back to Pellegrini and that contract extension. It’s been
nothing but a PR disaster for City. Of course the future of the manager is
going to affect what happens on the pitch- it shouldn’t, but it does. Such
instability and unrest has cost the club their third Premier League title.
That’s not being arrogant, but having been in an enviable position five games
in only to see Leicester run away with it…well, there’s more questions than
answers.
Pep coming to City has every fan excited – but what effect
has it had on Pellegrini? This Charming Man has transformed into Despised By
Most Fans and in most respects, he has been the master of his own downfall,
with a catalogue of damning errors/habits that crop up consistently. He never
has a Plan B: too many times a team have been allowed to come at City from the
off, grab an early goal and defend to secure all three points. We can’t cope
with teams who get at us, come at us with pace and we then struggle to break
said team down: see West Ham, Liverpool, Spurs and Stoke for further evidence
of this.
His stubbornness: Pellegrini has his favourites and it’s to
his detriment that his loyalty has proved unfounded. Bony, Navas and Demichelis
all fall into this category. It’s not his style, but a bit of visual passion
wouldn’t go amiss – the majority of his time is spent staring into the abyss in
an emotionless, hypnotic trance. Let’s be straight – the only trophy won by
City this season was decided on penalties, after the team spent the majority of
the 120 minutes wasting guilt-edged opportunities. Being wasteful in possession
and in front of goal has been the story of the season, along with a criminally
leaky defence that has barely been protected by its midfield.
It’s not been the Pep announcement that proved detrimental
to City’s season. The rot had already set in long before the rumours were
finally laid to rest, the cracks appearing by October after a 4-1 mauling at
White Hart Lane. At this moment, if City’s form doesn’t improve, Pep could
realistically be coming to manage a Europa League side (thankfully, the deal is said to be iron clad). The danger is that
it’s at no odds to Pellegrini whether City finish in the top four or not (apart from his bonus). Winning the
Premier League and the Capital One Cup in his first season has almost glossed
over the fact that he inherited a squad that Roberto Mancini helped build – and
has merely steered the ship on autopilot. Txixi Begiristain has largely been
calling the shots transfer-wise – with entirely mediocre results.
There’s no doubt it’s an ageing squad with desperate need
for renovation. Initially, it was signings like Robinho, Shay Given, Kompany,
Zabaleta and Nigel De Jong that signalled the changing of the guard at the
club. Then along came Gareth Barry, Kolo Toure, Joleon Lescott, Emmanuel
Adebayor, Carlos Tevez and Craig Bellamy. Building upwards and moving forwards,
in came Yaya, Silva, Kolarov, James Milner, Mario Balotelli, Aguero, Nasri and
Edin Dzeko. The balance of proven performers and winners at the most elite
level in football, coupled with flair and grit, was a recipe for success.
The more recent signings at the club have tended to see City
pay an extortionate premium based on a) the fact that it’s City paying and b)
potential. I’d put Sterling, Fernando, Mangala and Otamendi in that bracket. A
lack of organisation on the pitch, with Kompany invariably out, has been
alarming. Yaya is not captain material, whereas Hart is.
But where’s the passion and desire gone, the team spirit,
the focus and the will to win silverware? Surely with a new manager around the
corner they’d want to be playing to impress, or are they just a bunch of
mercenaries after all? With a current manager who has lost the plot, blinded by
the light at the end of the tunnel, it’s proving to be a sad end to an era.
There is the crumb of comfort that is the Champions League quarter final, but
how can a team that can only muster 0-0 draws against Norwich and Aston Villa
beat Zlatan and Co? Maybe Typical City still exists after all…
A MUCH NEEDED PEP
TALK
Onto the positives and there’s plenty of those. It’s a time
to clear the decks and start afresh. Let’s be realistic: rebuilding will be
expensive. Sheikh Mansour can afford it and Pep will want, expect and have been
promised only the best. It’s standard practise that City are linked with a
multitude of players daily, but it’ll be interesting to see who Pep targets to
help build is dynasty – and who he opts to show the door to.
It’s not just at City either. Euro 2016 will fill a void
that the Premier League leaves and comings and goings will be sure to fill the
back pages during the balmy months. Will Jose replace Louis Van Gaal? Who’s set
for the Chelsea job? Will West Ham hold onto Dimitri Payet? Similarly, will
Leicester be able to persuade Jamie Vardy and Riyad Mahrez to stay? As for Paul
Pogba, that will he or won’t he just refuses to go away.
With only a couple of months to wait until Pep’s arrival,
the only silver lining to City’s season (bar
a Champions League miracle), is the excitement that a summer of change will
bring. New faces create fresh expectation, but healthy optimism. Pep will be
sure to guarantee he is fully equipped in all departments to create a force to
be reckoned with moving into next season. Not only that, who doesn’t want to
see a manager of that calibre in the Premier League? Not only that, but at your
football club? As if you needed an excuse to get to the beer garden…
