As four pre-final defeats highlight, City’s mechanism is so complex that when it misfires it cannot easily be put rightAt what point does just one of those things become more than just one of those things? If Manchester City’s defeat to Real Madrid on Wednesday night were a one-off, it could be written off. What can you do about luck like that? If you have nine shots on target to the opposition’s none in the first 90 minutes and still lose 2-1 what, really, have you done wrong? Especially when you’ve dominated the first leg as City had done.But this keeps happening. Season after season, Pep Guardiola finds his teams dominating Champions League ties and losing. Bad luck follows him:...
Crunch time for Manchester City, Liverpool and Spurs, while Watford could be sent downFor the second week in a row, Liverpool can get their work done before sitting back to see how Manchester City fare. The extent of any European bounce or, in City’s case, hangover may be hard to predict but Jürgen Klopp’s men have certainly built up a fearsome head of steam to carry into the final four games. Like Liverpool, Spurs have a rival sitting just above them who, by and large, keep on winning: falling five points behind Arsenal this weekend could prove very costly going into Thursday’s north London derby and it adds to the sense that neither team can really afford anything but victory...
Manchester City were the more coherent team but the white noise and white light of the Bernabéu was decisive in semi-finalWhen the moment came it seemed to strike Daniele Orsato like a surge of static energy. The referee had been phlegmatic at the Bernabéu. He shrugged. He jogged. But this place does something to you. As Karim Benzema fell, ankle tapped by a lunge from Rúben Dias, even before his body hit the turf Orsato’s arm was springing out from his side, ramrod straight, possessed with the voodoo of another of these absurd electrical storms, these nights of white noise, white light, where nothing is ever done until it’s done.Benzema stepped up and rolled the penalty kick into the empty...
Phil Foden is a valuable set-piece deputy, Mike Jackson’s Clarets keep on moving, plus a defence of the retiring refereesSteven Gerrard prefers to vary his attacking shape to keep opponents guessing and has switched from using a midfield diamond to 4-2-3-1 to 4-3-3 in his first six months in charge at Aston Villa. The manager was in full agreement that his team looked better once Danny Ings came on as a substitute to join Ollie Watkins as split strikers, with Philippe Coutinho then playing between them, as a false 9 or as the attacking tip of a diamond depending on your interpretation. Both strikers scored in the victory that relegated Norwich and were also instrumental when Villa went on a...
Grealish acted as provocateur in chief at Elland Road while his teammates did the basics with precision and forcePerhaps when Jack Grealish signed for Manchester City, at the moment that contract was sealed, his elevation to this rarefied air confirmed, he might have imagined himself, just for one brief moment, swaggering, socks down, through his own ticker-tape parade, showered with glory, glitter, noise, screwed up pieces of white paper.Although perhaps not like this. Maybe if Grealish squinted a little the faces of the middle Yorkshiremen pelting him with litter might have resembled, if you did not listen too hard, an adoring chorus, a Grealish super-fandom event. Continue reading...