Manchester City’s dominance is increasing the trend towards one side dominating ball possession in games and that threatens to diminish the spectacleIn 1970, when studying the effects of the appearance of robots, the Japanese robotics professor Masahiro Mori discovered something strange was going on. The more human a robot’s appearance became, the more people demonstrated empathy towards it up to a certain point at which they felt strong revulsion.After that point, though, the more humanoid the robot became the more people began to respond positively again. There was a zone of resemblance, of almost‑humanness, that people found deeply disturbing: it was familiar enough for them to begin to engage on a human level only to find the robot deficient in...
A win at Crystal Palace will give City 19 league wins on the trot, a feat the coach also achieved in Munich. How do Pep’s record breakers compare?Manchester City managers of the future have a problem. The football played at the end of 2017 will always be the standard to which they are held. This month, City fan Noel Gallagher, a man not known for his compliments and somebody that has seen 250,000 people at Knebworth sing his name, described what is going on at the Etihad as “the greatest thing I’ve ever seen in my entire life”.Hyperbole perhaps, but if you do not agree that Pep Guardiola’s side are playing the best football of the Premier League era, then...
It took a while but the Manchester City manager has conquered England with a football that is not merely beautiful but also dominant. The question for 2018 is: can he now do it in Europe?The year ends with Pep Guardiola ascendant, his juego de posición, evolved over time and amended and slightly repackaged for England, cutting a swathe through the Premier League, just as it overwhelmed all in La Liga and the Bundesliga. There will be the usual complaints about how much money has been spent and, more pertinently, about the origin of that money, but English football has never seen anything quite like this.When Guardiola was winning two Champions Leagues in three seasons at Barcelona, their style became hegemonic. There...
Carvalhal needs immediate impact at Swansea, Schmeichel seeks redemption and Chelsea’s Azpilicueta-Morata combination threatens StokeThe wisdom of appointing Carlos Carvalhal as Swansea’s new manager is, to say the least, questionable: a man who was dismissed on Christmas Eve for underachieving with Sheffield Wednesday in the Championship does not inspire confidence. Still, he may prove successful: many doubted him when he arrived at Wednesday in 2015, and he started well there, reaching the play-offs in his first two seasons. But if he is to change things at the Liberty Stadium, he needs to do it immediately. After Saturday’s game at Watford, three of Swansea’s next four league games are against Tottenham Hotspur, Arsenal and Liverpool. If they do not beat the...
Pep Guardiola’s team may have claimed victory by just one goal but the gulf in class between the two sides at St James’s Park was still palpably hugeAfter five seconds, Jonjo Shelvey tried to score from near the halfway line. Ederson saved the Newcastle United midfielder’s ambitious effort with ease, however, and so it began, with Manchester City’s goalkeeper having to wait another 14 minutes before touching the ball again. One of his team-mates had passed it back to him, presumably just to make sure that the Brazilian had not nipped to the away dressing room to check the sound system.The home fans had a different view, sensing that a minor victory had been achieved, urging their rattled players to...