I agree, he improved after a quite shaky start and an incredible pass to Elmander which led to the Hooper goal. IMO, a definite improvement on Rusty.
Re. your (good) point about containing the FBs, IMO that's also why Fer played wide yesterday, to give Olsson some protection against the Dyer/Rangel combination.
I still wonder why CH doesn't try moving Olsson up to WL rather than pull Fer out of position. Perhaps there's a good reason he doesn't, but it makes more sense to me.
Agree with this 100%. Garrido can still do a job at LB and if Olsson were played wide left mid, he covers the ground quicker than Pilks and could soon get back to help out as and when required. I do think Fer has never really got out of second gear wide left - a bit like Howson didn't when forced out wide right. Horses for courses, and unlike Chelski and Man Citeh, we're not blessed with world class options in every position, so it's critical to use their time on the pitch to best advantage
I didn't hear CH's after-match interview. It seems likely he would be questioned about Fer. Did he have anything to say on it? (CH doesn't behave arbitrarily and without reason despite what some of us seem to think!)
I wasn't criticising CH, just wondering whether there was a reason for it. Certainly Swansea concentrate their attacks up the centre, so perhaps he felt Johnson was needed there. I can see that the injury situation means that players might well have to play out of position to compensate for that, but City have more options in defence than anywhere else.
And I didn't mean to imply you were aiming criticism! Just agreeing that there will have been a reason for it and interested to know if CH gave it after the match. (Even I don't think criticism aimed at CH is NEVER justified; I just think most of the flak he gets IS unjustified.)
Fair enough, Robbie. It could be that Olsson has been playing so well CH doesn't want to lose that. He's only played 11 matches so far, so is still settling in. His pace at the back is also useful (he almost got across to stop Dyer from scoring), so that might be considered more important. It could also be that CH wanted to be able to play all of Fer, Elmander, Howson and Johnson and that was the best way to do it. Like you, I have faith in CH's judgement.
A settled back four is usually deemed a good idea, I guess that could be one justification for it. No idea just how poor Garrido would be either. Personally I'd have preferred Wes to play "wide" with Fer and Howson central, but I guess without Johnson we'd have struggled more in central midfield, as we were never going to have a lot of possession anyway.
I actually think that was one game where we could have benefited from playing Wessi, but as for Olson as a winger and Garrido at full back, if Whitts was on the pitch we would have no cover if one of them got crocked although arguably with all of our centre mids on the pitch you could say the same. Really missed Snoddy given the amount of corners and free kicks we had, can't wait until our players come back from injury, should really improve our game.
