1. Guardiola overthought the lineup again
This was probably not the main reason, but there are still questions about the selection. O’Riley had looked good in previous matches alongside Rodri as a number eight, and Aït-Nouri had recently hit good form at left-back. Savinho, meanwhile, has had only one really strong game this season.
Starting Khusanov was widely expected before the match: he was supposed to man-mark Vinícius. But Nunes is having the best season of his career and offers far more in possession and going forward.
2. Arbeloa exploited the weaknesses of City’s structure
The bigger issue was the team structure rather than the individual choices. Over the past couple of months Guardiola has experimented with a 4-2-2-2 system without wingers, packing the central areas. Against Real Madrid, that system might actually have worked better.
In that setup O’Riley had been effective as a central midfielder, helping Rodri defensively while also making regular late runs into the box.
Against Real, however, Guardiola went with two wingers: Doku, returning from injury, and Savinho, who had just been named man of the match against Newcastle.
When pressing Real’s goal kicks, City tried to push very high with a narrow structure: Haaland and Semenyo up front, Bernardo between them; Doku and Savinho tucked inside, with Rodri as the lone holding midfielder.
Rodri being alone in that role was the key problem. Two Real attackers — Brahim Díaz and Arda Güler — kept dropping deep to receive the ball and constantly found space. Rodri simply could not cover both of them.
In the 20th minute Guéhi stepped forward to help Rodri press Brahim in midfield. Courtois immediately launched a long ball behind City’s defensive line and Valverde ran onto it. O’Riley had no cover behind him, Guéhi was stuck in midfield, and Dias did not shift across quickly enough. Goal.
3. Real Madrid played exactly the type of game they love against City
Real followed a classic blueprint associated with Ancelotti — or even Mourinho: compact defending with two solid lines and rapid vertical counterattacks.
The first goal took eight seconds from Courtois’ pass to the finish. The second took fifteen seconds from building out from their own half to scoring.
4. An exceptional individual performance from Federico Valverde
Valverde produced the game of his life. During the match he solved Real’s biggest defensive issue on the flank: Trent Alexander-Arnold initially struggled against Jérémy Doku, but Valverde started dropping back as a fifth defender to help cover him, while still pressing City in midfield whenever the ball was on the opposite side.
The Uruguayan’s work rate and tactical intelligence effectively shut down City’s main attacking channel.
With no true striker in Real’s system (nominally Vinícius and Díaz played up front, but Vinícius drifted wide left and Díaz dropped deep to receive), the central striker zone was often empty. Valverde began attacking that space with late runs from midfield — and that is exactly how he scored the second and third goals.
5. Fatigue among English teams
Out of six matches in the Champions League round of 16, English clubs did not win a single one, and three ended in heavy defeats.
The Premier League is currently the most competitive league in Europe, with extremely intense football and two domestic cup competitions. By the decisive stage of the season, teams arrive physically and mentally exhausted.
Guardiola has repeatedly complained about the calendar and about the unwillingness of English football authorities to help teams competing in the Champions League.
by baldfraud34
16 Comments
I’ll say this. If Nunes and RAM started this game, I think we at least get 1 or 2 goals back and therefore completely changes the narrative of the tie going back to the Etihad.
My main three reasons
1. We
2. Were
3. Shit
More of this kind of analysis
Number 5 really puts things into perspective- well at least for me.
Guardiola never faces accountability, only “He overthought it again, silly pep, hahahahaha” it’s unprofessional bullshit. You don’t drop your best passer and play your worst at cam, two ageing midfielders in a double pivot while dropping your best rb, and starting khusanov there who should have started at cb over your slow cb in Dias who has been crap for 3 years now, while playing a ridiculous high line against a counter attacking team like vardrid. He does this shit every year in the ucl at City and Bayern with the exception of when he played his best, simple lineup and had a team so loaded not winning a treble would be a disgrace. People need to stop acting surprised by it, it’s so tiring seeing the same mediocre coaching every year from him in the ucl, the comp he was brought in to win, getting played off.
To be fair, Barcelona has also played a lot of games lately, including a very demanding one against Atleti last week, which is probably why they played relatively poorly against Newcastle. Otherwise that probably would have been another defeat of an English team.
Apart from the tactical aspects, there were individual mistakes too, esp for the 1st and 3rd goals
https://preview.redd.it/9ud1nqbzenog1.png?width=1798&format=png&auto=webp&s=d1d0c7d1a22395c67d4b989e1daabeac2ddd38cb
4 players ball watching
guehi, dias or rodri could’ve been much tighter
you know in retrospect i wish NOR had been instructed to step up and play alongside Rodri in attack
You are overthinking it too. The reason for the defeat is you faced a much better team and players.
To be fair – hats off to Madrid… Fede hatty. They defended well. Courtois made an insane save… So it was a perfect storm.
Alot had to go in their favor and Pep maybe over thought the lineup. I don’t think it was ALL on the formation and lineup.
Personally, I think the players need some accountability as well. Pep’s selection didn’t help them for sure but to just chalk it up to that is lazy analysis.
There were multiple points in the game where City broke through Madrid’s defense but no final product… Ball just trickling out for a goal kick.
Haaland didn’t have alot of service but these are the games where you have to sometimes create your own magic. He’s the main guy, been leading the lines… I would want to see more from him to help decide moments… Again individual moments decide these games and unfortunately Madrid made more individual plays than City on the night.
Hopefully at the Etihad will be a different story.
The whole “fatigue” argument is complete BS imo, they play 2 games per week, its not like they’re playing every other night. (its not like it was last season when we had 14/15 players available for that long period of time, then I’d understand). Only 4 players from that Newcastle win started yesterday in Madrid. so the other 7 have no excuses, Madrid played on Monday, Friday and then last night, but they weren’t fatigued and beat us everywhere on the pitch, because simply, they wanted it more than us.
English teams just aren’t that good, this is one of the worst and more predictable City sides in years and we’re 2nd in the league… What does that say about the rest of the league? Arsenal are top and don’t look that great either. The other European teams were just better than us this week
In the end, we were actually just shit. No heart or desire in the play, Pep overthinking by playing 3 wingers instead of an attacking midfielder who could actually create something, nothing more else to it really. The tie isn’t over, we can come back and win but that will require a lot from us and Pep.
Man… I know this is harsh but GUEHI absolutely shat himself on the bigstage… Khusa and Dias had one side locked even tho some mistakes were made but both did great to recover… but the LB and LCB were too vulnerable … it was like all out defence was concentrated on one side only
Great post
Good analysis. Very spot on.
Could you say there’s something about how our attacks were made? Or rather where we lacked and what could’ve been improved upon.
It was Real Madrid that’s the real problem every time the pundits say “We’ll I expect City to win even though it’s Real Madrid” I immediately expect us to lose.
Great analysis, I feel you hit everything on the spot