That was una buena batalla (one good battle), wasn’t it?!
Well, it wasn’t (at least for the last 60 minutes). Fans ran the show with a banner poking Los Blancos for their boycott of the Ballon d’Or ceremony. Who ran the show apart from the fans? One of them they were trying to poke – Vinicius.
City were good in the first 30 minutes of the game until Grealish got injured. That shifted the game’s control to the visitors (Real Madrid). Haaland’s opener was canceled shortly after Kylian Mbappe fluked the ball past the goal through the leaky City defense.
All in all, City struggled to gain control back but they couldn’t. How did that happen? Let’s take a deeper look.
Negative Impact Substitutes from Pep Guardiola
Subs should darle la vuelta al juego (turn the game around) for the team they play for. But last night it was quite the opposite. At half-time, Rico Lewis replaced the injured Manuel Akanji and in the 60th minute, Nathan Ake was replaced by Mateo Kovacic. The game went on, and Rico Lewis was the first one to make the mistake that led to a conversion from Brahim Diaz.
Later, it was a wrong pass from Mateo Kovacic that led the City’s defense to a vulnerable position. Then came the extra-time winner from none other than the Englishman Jude Bellingham.
I have said in some of my other posts that the squad depth at City is way too thin for any cubiertos (silverware) this season. The subs are not on point most of the time, and they always struggle to maintain the momentum of the game.
The Winning Mentality is Just Not There
It is not the same City as last season. They are too weak when it comes to the mentality. They don’t have the same spirit, and the club direly needs a complete overhaul of the team.
Conceding goals is a part of the game, but losing the will and determination to turn the game around is not okay, especially for a team of Manchester City’s status.
What’s wrong then?
I rewatched the games in high-definition to find out the problems through my surefire Cox Internet. Their Cox en español customer support recommended that I get their 250 Mbps connection, which was more than enough for live streaming at high definition. Though the watching experience was seamless and great, being a Cityzen, I didn’t like what I saw.
I have seen players making mistakes around the dangerous zones of the pitch. Those mistakes were mainly because of the confianza perdida (lost confidence) that City needs to recapture. Lack of confidence leads to lost determination, and most importantly, focus.
The solution I see is a complete overhaul of the squad except for Haaland and Gvardiol. Those lads are trying to give everything they can on the pitch.
No Defending ‘Yet Again’
You go through the opponent’s defense and score the goal that could be one of the many winning goals of the game. But the thing is that you have to defend your lead to sustain the winning. The full off-the-ball game was just awful against Madrid from Manchester City’s defense.
The backline was esparcidos por el campo (scattered across the pitch), and the midfield was non-existent.
That was the exact reason they have conceded six more goals than they conceded in the whole season in 2023-24. Another issue here is the physicality, which might directly correlate to the mentality. There is not enough fuel in the team, whenever they hit the 75th minute of the game.
And then the usual happens: goals are being conceded.
The Old-Age Factor
When footballers hit their 30s, they are considered in their prime but at City, it is quite the opposite.
The midfield of De Bruyne, Gundogan, and Bernardo Silva are all in their 30s, and they are the only starters left in the game. I think Modric (who is close to being 40) played a better game than the mentioned midfield trio of City.
The young players, on the other hand, neither have enough experience, nor the mentality to add anything valuable to the team. The only solution is a renovation project for the whole team from scratch.
I think that’s it for the tactical analysis. If I miss anything, you can always drop your comments and I will try to incorporate them in my upcoming post.
