Probably the best time to play Arsenal for City since the capture of the wonderful talent Ozil in the transfer window,I felt in midweek when they played Napoli that they just looked a bit jaded and City were fortunate to have been able to get some rest into the legs of our key players. I do wonder at times when opposition come to the Etihad what the mindset is of the coaching staff in regards to set up and tactics. All the information is there for all to see,teams that come and sit back,allow City space and time on the ball or teams that come to park the bus have lost every game in the last 3 seasons while teams that press the ball and cramp our playing style are the ones who get some joy,they clearly don't always come away with anything but every team that has left with points have caused us the same problems by giving our midfield no time to settle be it Bayern or Norwich at the back end of the season.Southampton know how to effectively stop City playing and we were extremely fortunate to leave st Mary's last week with a share of the points. Wenger is seen by many as a master tactician,but I felt he got it totally wrong yesterday. Having Walcott in side should have enabled Arsene to play narrow,swamping the space for Nasri & Siva threading balls through to Aguero/Negredo,pressing the ball to create the inevitable mistakes by City and play on the break utilising walcotts pace against our porous & suspect back line. Whether Arsene thought he could simply out pass City or perhaps he knew the energy levels weren't there to effectively press as a team I don't know but the difference from the season before when we were played off the park and yesterday was stark. Blaming the officials for the defeat made him look a poor loser,when I think taking Flamini off and exposing an already struggling back line was a far bigger issue. Defeat at the Etihad is hardly the end of the world,not many will realistically be leaving with many points this season but I just thought Arsenal played into our hands rather than making us really work for it. January window will be an interesting one for arsenal as Giroud clearly can't be expected to do this workload on his own and already looks half the player of 2 months ago If the squad is topped up with a couple of quality players I think they will be right there at the end with City & Chelsea Regards PPLF
This In some ways I think we suffered a similar fate to the Napoli game, getting caught between trying to attack and limit the opposition and coming away with neither. I said from the off yesterday that we were allowing City too much time on the ball and that we should have been pressing them quicker and hurrying them into mistakes. When we do that, we do it well too. I don't know why we sat off and allowed City so much time, because as you rightly say the evidence is there for all to see that teams who do that, get murdered.
