Aguero, Balotelli, Tevez.

When Tevez is 100% fit do you think RM should drop Aguero or Balotelli to the bench to make way for him bearing in mind he was joint top goal scorer?

I like Balotelli but am becoming increasingly frustrated with his performances, Aguero may not be as skilled (if you believe the pundits) but i prefer him because like Tevez he always puts a shift in and you almost expect a goal every time he gets the ball in the box.

For me its got to be Aguero and Tevez every time.

 

Aguero can't be dropped. To score this many goals in his first season in a new country is incredible. Very unselfish player, never seems to have a bad game, he scores a lot of goals....perfect forward.

Balotelli is one of the most talented youngsters on the planet IMO, but performances like last night's are very frustrating. When he wants to be he is a top player but not always. He needs to get some more competition in attack, so he knows he has to work for his place and puts in 100% every game he plays.

Tevez has to start on Saturday for me. Tough away game to Stoke, the kind of game he'll be very helpful. A sulking Balotelli will offer nothing.

Tevez isn't a popular man with a lot of fans, but we need to play him. He is a top footballer. He was brilliant when he came on last night, looked like he was trying to prove himself. We have to make use of him, even if it is only until the end of the season. He is our player after all.

 

Balotelli is just a knobhead and we need to get rid
For stoke I'd play Aguero up top on his own and give silva a rest,if we don't we might not get much out of him for the last few games when we'll really need him.Presuming Kompany and Lescott are still out I'd go for
Hart
Zabaleta Richards kolo Clichy
De Jong Barry
Milner yaya Nasri
Aguero
Use Dzeko/Tevez with Johnson as plan B
Tevez may well be a treacherous bastard but if he helps us win the title I'm all for the little **** playing

 

^ ^ ^ This ^ ^ ^

Having just read RMs opinion of his performance last night i guess like us he is beginning to lose patience with him.

 

I hope we don't see Johnson in the team Saturday. He's useless. He rarely beats his man and I don't think he's good enough for us. We should get rid. Mancini seems to have been playing him in the lesser games this season, and he hasn't even shone against weaker opponents. Even against poor sides he's been subbed early.

Remember Sunderland? He was up against a teenage midfielder at left back and didn't beat him once. Crap!

Silva definitely needs a rest he's been way off it recently. With Nasri playing as he did last night we should cope without him.

 

Mario Balotelli (left) and Carlos Tevez leave the pitch at the Britannia Stadium after dropping two points in the title race
Manchester City's strike-force could be facing a £100m overhaul this summer if their away-goal drought carries on.

The Blues’ title chase has stumbled as their expensive attacking trio, who were scoring for fun at the start of the season, have hit a barren patch.

Edin Dzeko has bagged one goal in his last nine away league matches, Mario Balotelli’s game has faltered just as the stakes have been raised, and Carlos Tevez remains a blot City would rather remove from their copybook, and their wage bill.

Only Sergio Aguero, who has been a big hit with 24 goals in his debut season, can be sure of his place – unless Dzeko or Balotelli, or preferably both, can emerge as heroes in the remaining nine games.

The statistics don’t lie, and City’s title lead has been whittled away due to their persistent failure to score away from home. Those stats also show chances haven’t dried up – it’s the conversion rate which has fallen dramatically.

Dzeko has been a curious case this season. The man who scored four at Tottenham in August looked like a player who had finally thrown off the shackles of his £25m price tag and was about to destroy Premier League defences, as he used to do in the Bundesliga with Wolfsburg.

He has not been happy with the number of games he has had since then, and perhaps his confidence has suffered as a result.

There is also an argument that City’s lack of effective width has not helped his game. Three of his four goals in that memorable 5-1 win at White Hart came from players hitting the byline and then landing crosses on his foot or head. But the Blues rely heavily on their full-backs to provide width these days, which usually means slow build-up and sometimes poor quality of cross.

Adam Johnson has hit a plateau in his development, and is not the type of winger who darts to the byline and plonks crosses on the head of a 6ft 3in striker in any case.
Maybe Dzeko’s season would have been different had the Blues nailed down their No 1 target last summer, Alexis Sanchez, who instead went to Barcelona from Udinese.

That lack of pace and penetration in wide areas was woefully obvious at Stoke on Saturday, as City tried to play through a tight, determined and well-organised defence, rather than getting around them.

Maybe the solution for Dzeko is to bring complementary players in rather than flog him, although Bayern Munich and Juventus are already eyeing the situation with some interest.
Gareth Barry and David Platt admit Manchester City can’t afford to drop any more points

Manchester City's Gareth Barry says there is no room for error

Roberto Mancini will expect Dzeko to step up in these final nine games. The goalscoring charts show that the big Bosnian has 18 goals so far, a decent return, but 13 of them came before Christmas. The same goes for Balotelli, who has netted 11 of his 15 goals in this campaign before the mid-season point.

It is plain for everyone to see that the 21-year-old Italian has the ability to land the title for City in these last few weeks. He has shown a capacity for eking a goal out of the tightest of situations with a flash of intuition.

And last season we were sticking him in the pigeon-hole marked “big game player” when he turned it on for the FA Cup semi-final against United and in the final against Stoke, but looked ordinary in more humdrum games. But now is the time for big game players to come to the fore, and Balotelli seems more intent on trying to earn free-kicks, and feeling sorry for himself.

Mancini has shown immense patience with the erratic youngster, and admits he spends plenty of time coaxing and cajoling the kid in an attempt to bring the world-class talent out of him, and bury the flaky elements of his personality deep within.

Attitude

There have been times this season when Mancini’s message seemed to be getting through, as his work-rate improved, his attitude was excellent and his threat was doubled.

That has changed. Even on a stage like last week’s crunch against Chelsea, he was anonymous, and when presented with a great chance his inordinate self-belief failed him and he dragged his shot wide.

There is time for Balotelli to redeem himself. He is the type who should relish the drama of this run-in, and imagine himself as the hero who brings the title to City after a 44-year absence.

Talking of redemption, Tevez also has it on his mind. While his motives in coming back to City may have been purely selfish, now he is here he would love to be the hero.

City’s stance on Tevez remains exactly as it was 12 months ago. They would rather be rid of him once and for all, but that does not mean they will be accepting the first eight-figure offer that happens along this summer.

And if suitors Juventus, Corinthians and Inter Milan don’t get close to the Blues’ £25m valuation, he will again be going nowhere.

Tevez will never be forgiven by many Blues, even by some of those ready to utilise his talents in the last nine games.

But no-one should doubt that City will have a player committed to trying to win them the title, even if it is just to enhance his own profile rather than for the benefit of the club or the fans.

Those three strikers will come under intense scrutiny when City’s three owners meet with the management team in June to review the season and plan for those ahead.
Mancini has made no secret of his admiration for Napoli strike pair Edinson Cavani and Ezequiel Lavezzi, and there have even been whispers of an audacious bid for Real Madrid ace Cristiano Ronaldo in the corridors of the Etihad Stadium.

There has to be at least one striker coming in, and at least one will leave.

Unless the current state of affairs changes in the fateful final two months of the campaign, it is not beyond the realms of possibility that, come next August, Tevez and Aguero remain and Balotelli and Dzeko will have departed.

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