No idea, though I've made it no secret I can't stand this inverted fullback nonsense anyway. The FBs end up being far out of position leaving us susceptible to counters and they're proving rarely helpful in attacks this season too as they're just occupying spaces that you'd rather Son/ Kulusevski/ Maddison to be taking up.
He often receives the ball from one of Romero or Porro and more often than not, nothing comes of it. For all the stick Werner deservedly gets, nine times out of ten he will receive the ball and immediately take on his man. Seven times out of ten, he is successful. Sadly at that point it hovers between half and once out of ten that he will do anything meaningful with the ball in the opposition box, but that's academic. The point is his first thought is to use his pace to scare the opposition full back. Johnson isn't doing that enough and that's where the criticism is being directed. We didn't spend £40m on a player for him to have a nice little purple patch and then essentially regress into a Welsh Harry Winks.
The whole structure of the team befuddles me. Especially the inter-relationship between the FBs, CMs and wide attackers. I get the feeling Ange just sets out the broad parameters of his philosophy and then tells the players to just go out there and interpret the game as they see fit, similar to Harry Redknapp's coaching style. But unless you're giving interpretive freedom to the likes of Bale, Modric, Lennon and VDV, it probably isn't doing to work.
He absolutely does get more abuse than anyone else at the club, entirely because he's the player it's been decided is the one who will **** up and thus any setback means he "should" be punished for it Aurier being the butt of jokes is not the same as receiving targeted harassment - and Johnson's hardly alone in our squad for receiving that, as Pedro Porro had to disable his socials eighteen months ago for the same reason, and it's no coincidence that happened when Porro was the lightning rod for Conte's system collapsing in on itself, but once again it was somehow the fault of one player and not the manager or their system or the obvious issue that our midfield was seemingly instructed not to try a through ball for fear of being castrated with a paperclip
Werner gets way more abuse than Johnson by an absolute country mile. Richarlison also gets pelters. Johnson definitely doesn't get more than them. He just got more attention brought to him after he deactivated socials. Aurier got absolute dogs abuse and practically became the symbol of mediocrity for this club. He was even getting abused before he joined us due to his comments and actions in France.
Werner doesn't get abuse, he's treated as a punchline more than anyone else in the squad not named Whiteman or Austin - and Richy technically can't get abuse because he's perpetually injured Johnson gets targeted abuse, as that one prick during the Coventry match made abundantly clear, and there is no comparing the two
I know he’s had injury problems but purely qualitatively, VdV looked like mustard straight away. So that’s a more recent example, but I’d say your point stands. It’s been few and far between.
I think he’s a bit more prescriptive than that. The FBs are a major problem right now though, mainly because they’re both not in the best form and we don’t have adequate backups due to injuries and shoddy recruitment. But also he changed a bit how he used them as last season went on and I think the fact that Destiny in particular pushes so high and inside causes problems both in the buildup and in how Son plays. Sonny has looked the best when Destiny stays outside him more often and comes inside as a variation, rather than the other way round. Porro and Johnson have a better dynamic and understanding around them generally, though Porro isn’t on his best form. The midfield balance is also an issue but that’s partly due to the FBs. The FBs should be either side of the 6 ahead of the 2 CBs in a 2-3 structure when we have the ball, offering circulation options and being on hand to help stop counters when they make it through our initial press. Because they’re so high, our midfield gets isolated even when it’s Sarr instead of Maddison, and that causes issues even when VdV is fit, which he’s currently not.
Oh we've made some signings that have turned out good don't get me wrong but van de Ven didn't join with much of a pedigree and if truth be told he was the second preference of many of our fanbase (myself included to be honest) when it came between him or Tapsoba. He's the type of player that would've joined us at WHL too I'd say. What I'd love is basically the other vdV feeling upon a signing. When Rafa got announced he was joining us from Madrid, our fanbase went into a frenzy and he delivered (and some!) on that hype. We've ended up having better players than him over the years (Eriksen, Son, possibly Dembele) but they all joined as sort of players with promising futures. It'd be great to bring in that finished article type, one who immediately sells a **** ton of shirts and get fans salivating and the media hyping it up. I think as Spurly touched on, we're happy to pay the fees but seemingly not the wages for a top player, so that results in us ending up with players like Richarlison.
There's also an issue with Romero's role in the buildup at the moment In Conte's system he was the guy who'd take the ball up the pitch from the back, in some games practically playing as a box to box midfielder In Ange's system it's Mickey Van who takes the ball up the pitch while Romero plays through balls from the back The issue is that with Dragusin playing due to Mickey Van's absence, that means the pressure is on Romero to replicate the way Mickey Van moves the ball while Dragusin sits - but due to burnout due to playing approximately 450 games in the last two years Romero doesn't really take on the ball like the system requires him to, and Dragusin can't fill the void as he's better sitting back and chipping passes forward from a comparatively static position This in turn has a knock-on effect to our midfield and FBs, because with Mickey Van bombing forward Udogie and Maddison knew they could time their runs to receive the ball, as our passing network for a lot of our games demonstrates as we tend to be more active down the left - but with him out the options are to either play Romero LCB and have him replicate the way Mickey Van moves and passes, or have Davies come in to play like Mickey Van Bought Off Wish
The full back thing was something he should should left in Scotland but I feared he would persist with it. Worked for Celtic domestically because he had far superior players compared to opponents. In the PL you can’t play like that imo. It worked at first because people didn’t know about it, now the data is there, it’s been exposed imo.
Agreed. And while Udogie is still young, Porro is supposedly entering his peak years and tbh whenever I see him, it still makes total sense that he was initially signed to be a RWB in a system that played 3 CBs. The guy just isn't a FB.
Grealish has scored 14 goals for Man City in 3.3 seasons. If we had paid 100m for that outcome you would be saying he was one of our worst ever signings. Harry Kane was coveted by several top clubs. Eze is completely unproven at the highest level.
I personally wasn't much fazed that we didn't bring in Eze. Last season showed that creating chances and scoring goals wasn't much of a problem. The catastrophe we were all expecting in that department post-Kane never materialised. Last season also showed that we really struggle to control the tempo of games and manage them to a desired outcome. This season has showed this is still a huge problem. So for the umpteenth time, the area that needed huge investment but received very little is the midfield. It still needs that investment. No point breaking the bank on a player like Eze if no-one behind him can feed him the ball consistently and in good positions.
So to summarise; we've got an incompetent Board who have signed a pile of players who don't have the right mentality nor the right skill set. The manager is lacking in coaching ability and plays a ridiculous formation that has no hope of success. So how are we scoring two goals per game and conceding one in every competition this season and how on earth did we finish fifth last year?
Grealish has never been a regular goal scorer, he wasn’t bought for his goals. He’s been part of a team that’s won numerous league titles including a treble winning season that involved the champions league. We could’ve also signed him for £25m but low balled for so long that when we did offer it Villa rightly told us to do one. Eze was coveted by a lot of clubs, including Man City.
What amuses me are people claiming that Ange is naive, his tactics are wrong and he lacks experience. So are we to assume that the critics are more experienced in football management? I assume you would have to have some hands on experience to know what you are talking about. Only seems to happen in football
Because we started the season with a 10 game unbeaten run that included 8 wins. We were top of the league up until the Chelsea loss. Then results and performances became mixed and towards the end of the season were terrible. We’ve since continued that form into this season, seeing as we’ve lost 10 of our last 18 league games which is close to bottom half form and not far off of relegation form. We’re 8 points worse off than at this stage last season. So unless we have an upturn in form, we won’t be matching last season’s finish.
