MANCINI - ONE WORD..............

FUCKING SHITE TONIGHT!

Cannot believe that team selection - but worse....cannot believe he stood there and watched that awful team performance for 80 minutes before he decided to bring on Aguero or AJ.

I like the guy for what he has done so far this season in the PL.......but posted before the game....what an awful line-up/formation.

I'm worried what that result will do for us on Sunday. All second half we were shite.

Lescott tonight was awful. Dzeko - non-existent. Zaba - utility player AT VERY BEST against lower teams from the PL.

ONE PLAYER THOUGH - FUCKING KOLOROV!!!!!!!!!!!! WTF IS HE ALL ABOUT?????????

He IS as poor as Wayne Bridge. Cannot pass, cannot tackle, cannot defend, cannot cross..I never want to see him in a City shirt again.

I'm really pissed off with Mancini tonight. Why he didn't make changes immediately at half time is FUCKING BEYOND ME!!!!

Zaba was getting skinned every time.....Yaya did fuck all.....yet he still waited.

I want him to come out and say that the CL means fuck all to him, the PL is the only priority....and if so...fair enough - BECAUSE THAT IS WHAT IT LOOKED LIKE TONIGHT !!!

AWFUL AWFUL AWFUL!

ANNOYED??? TOO FUCKING RIGHT - AS THEY WERE ONLY DECENT ON THE BREAK - THAT WAS IT!

Well......interviewed on Sky....he didn't look that arsed and said "this is our first time in the CL"

Fair enough....but if he cannot see what was going on tonight...when a win would have put us through.....then that concerns me for the rest of the season in the PL, when we are down against GOOD teams.

Come on Bobby - it's all 4 fronts...not just the PL!!

Dzeko has been poor in most CL games. Should have been Balo & Aguero.
Clichy & Micah are better FBs than Zabba & Kolarov

I missed virtually the whole game due to my fucking computer playing up. Shit night shit result shit computer !!!

bluey, sleep on it mate.

we were poor and got sucked into their game.

but we have been like that most of the season. we start slowly and give teams chances, sometimes a few chances and manage to get away with it because we have moments of magic, score a couple and then the opposition is opened up and we can cruise.

much like what napoli did to us tonight and what bayern did in munich.

i didn't like that set up either. After starting well, Dzeko had been poor. his control has been a big let down.

barry and NDJ, with no Deko at all.

I'd have gone 4-2-3-1 and made damn sure they didn't get the chance to break on us so easily and so readily.

we just couldn't afford to lose tonight and it's well out of our hands now.

Stranger things have happened. Yes it was poor, but it is not the end of the world in the grand scheme.

He does seem to have stuck with that similar team right through the CL campaign, which isn't really a bad thing as they team seem to have accepted it and know where they stand.

The strongest 11 will be back on Sunday and hopefully back to winning ways.

But I think you are right the CL was not his priority.

FUCK ME.......OPTIMISM IS RIFE ON HERE TONIGHT....sorry guys, but have to disagree...had time to reflect, and still feel exactly the same. SHITE by Mancini with his team selection, shite by his use of subs, shite performance by the players he picked...I'm not going to flower over the debacle and believe that we had the chance to cement a chance of going far in this comp....but not now, relying on Napoli getting beat or drawing and us having to beat Bayern...awful all round. FACT. Sorry if you guys don't want to look at it that way...but it was just that. AWFUL.

I've now slept on it and I'm still pissed off.

The only explanation can be that the C/L is not Bobby's priority, I think the 10 year plan was to win the C/L in a couple of years from now, so no pressure from our owners.

I can't see myself making the 300 mile round trip for the Europa League games on a Thursday night.

Very very disappointing!

Totally agree with OP but Balotelli was utterly shite too blueboy. To only put Aguero and AJ on with less than 9mins to go is imo totally unacceptable when you're chasing the game. Napoli were ordinary for most parts and there for the taking, yet Mancini still let them dictate things through his naiveness.

Barry should have started allowing Yaya to play further up to support 1 (yes 1) forward and i honestly couldn't give 2 shits who that 1 forward was tbh. Why the fuck did he start with Balotelli on the LEFT WING? complete and utter waste of time.

At the end of the day the table doesn't lie, we just haven't been good enough.........simple as. Although that team selection didn't help last night.

Shaken...agree, that why I said ALL the players including Balotelli...but Dzeko's control was as poor as I've seen from him - but then again, I suppose he hasn't played many games for us recently. Still no excuse.

I don't want to post a new thread on this, but can people actually give me their honest thoughts on Kolorov? For me - he's fucking useless and it pisses me off he keeps getting picked. He has a good shot - for free-kicks that's it, but he's nowhere near as effective as Clichy and certainly cannot defend for toffee.

I'm all for squad rotation, but surely not every friggin game. RM knew all we had to do last night was avoid defeat to keep things in our own hands, yet he took that away from us last night.

Re Kolarov: I think you've summed him up there mate.

I don't think it was specifically against Kolorov or Zabba. Their breaks were'nt directly against either full back.

2 of their best chances came from Yaya gifting Napoli the ball in the middle of the park.

First half we were better team, second half we didn't turn up.

my summung up:

They knew if they lost, they were out. If they drew, qualifying was out of their hands. They play way better on the break and their forwards are a handful.

With that information in hand, I would not have played with two up front and, if I did, then I would have had Balotelli and Aguero.

Dzeko, for all the improvement, cannot control the ball quickly enough for us to maintain pressure.

I can understand why Bobby changed the full backs but Richards is a far better attacking, and defensive, option than Zabba. In case Micah got caught upfield, play two holding mids.

Without being ultra defensive, if they don't score, we qualify.

I would have gone:

Hart
Richards, VK, JoLo, Clichy
Barry, NDJ
Milner, Yaya, Silva
Balotelli

We were not good enough mentally either. When they scored we played like dicks.

Too many guys wanted to do everything themselves. Yaya dribbling! You had Silva trying to take three guys on in our own half. Suffice to say he lost the ball and put us under pressure. What was Silva doing have pops outside the area?

The first goal was piss poor defending and the second was crap as well. How many defenders did we have in the box? Why wasn't Cavani's run tracked?

You don't see Barca or Real Madrid change their team too much for the opposition. They know they are good enough not to have to do so.

We aren't that good (yet) but we need to also play to our strengths.

If Cavani had been playing for us instead of Dzeko, no doubt we'd have hit them for plenty.

It wasn't good enough and wasn't what we've come to expect.

Just remember that we aren't 'that' good. We could easily have lost to QPR and Newcastle had a great chance to score before we did on Saturday. We are giving teams far too many chances and rely on them not being good enough to score. Thankfully, most premier league teams don't have shit hot strikers like Cavani.

All in all, not a good night, but we must learn from this experience.

I want Bobby to put out our strongest team for every league match. The league has to be our priority. I don't care if some players get upset - work harder, get better, deserve your place in the 1st team or piss off.

Agreed Dawg, Silva shooting did surprise me too.

On Richards, he wasn't even on the bench so wondering if he was carrying a knock from the weekend, he did get clattered a few times against Toon.

Don't forget Yaya's shot that cleared the running track apparently :p

why were we shooting from long range?

the idea is to hold the ball, pass it around, make them come out after it and pass it round some more before making a killer pass.

why did we resort to playing like dicks mode?

that mindset has to be altered and bobby has to play his best team all the time so that they can 'gel' even better together.

teams will look at us and think we are there for the taking. we have the individual quality to get ourselves out of trouble but in the prem league we haven't been behind much at all.

We have to win the next 4 matches.

Agreed Dawg.

"most premier league teams don't have shit hot strikers like Cavani".

He scored with a "lucky" glancing header and a free shot from 10yds, I'd have to say both were down to rank bad defending rather than great finishing. As you said, his run should have been tracked (for the 2nd) but it wasn't and why the fuck do we not have players on posts at corners, it baffles and annoys me this.

he 2nd was a sweet hit, not blasted, just timed wonderfully. in the premier league that would have been a foot nearer joe and he'd have kicked it away.

we cannot let the wheels fall off and we need to put on a power display against liverpool who will be well up for it.

on a positive note, i thought milner played well again.

I just hope the poor players dont get picked by MANCini gof awhile because they let him and us down big time. Now we are in the channel 5 cup, still last chance to win it.

I'm going to go out on a limb here guys..



I think we'll still qualify. I think we'll beat a Bayern team who have already won the group, and I think Napoli will only draw in Spain.



There. I've said it

Shit, didn't mean to press the send button

Hmmm...

I was less angry about this than I was by getting beaten by Bayern, but I suspect the whole Tevez thing was the root cause there. This game I thought we didn't do nearly enough to win it.

I don't think Balo was as bad as some think he was, just not as good as he's been recently. Dzeko was poor, Zaba wasn't quick enough and Yaya looked knackered. As for Kolarov - apart from taking a bullet from the team near the death, he was shocking. On the positives, Lescott, Hart and Milner had decent games.

Did anyone see the shot of Aguero as he was waiting to come on? He asked the fourth official how long was left and, when told, his face basically said, "Well, what on earth am I expected to do with so little time left?" What he did do showed he should've been on a bloody sight longer.

And we panicked too much after both their goals. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

Lescott was shit leo, i think he thought we were still playing in blue as he kept giving the ball to them all the time .

Yeah, you could sense Agueros frustration but he only thought what every other City fan thought.

We were much better than them first half - even though a couple of our players were off form. I think panic set in and confidence dropped second half after their game. I agree that Bobby should have played Richards and Clichy. Dzeko should be used in Prem games only - we needed Aguero Balotelli and Silva.

Anyway they weren't shite - they are not shite - we thought Richards was shite last season and Milner and Barry. Short memories.

Speak for yourself Wensdi I only thought Lescott is shite in the last 2 years and I still stand by my word!

I was speaking for myself G-Sus.

So "we" in "we thought..." was the royal "I" presumedly!

shakencity wrote:Lescott was shit leo, i think he thought we were still playing in blue as he kept giving the ball to them all the time

I don't think it was all the time. I'm sure most of the midfield were worse when it came to slack passing and even Silva wasn't on form. All I know is that Lescott was the only one in the back four who didn't let anyone past him. Although he may well have done, the stream I was watching crapped out so often I could've missed anything...

Anyway, all that said, we've been looking off the boil for a while now and we've been fortunate to keep winning regardless. Hopefully this is the kick up the arse we needed as nine wins on the spin has clearly made us complacent. And hopefully Bobby will realise we NEED Clichy and Richards in the critical games.

But that said, I don't want us to become all-conquering just yet. I'm enjoying the ride and if we get to our destination too soon it'll get boring.

I couldn't really get a good feel for the game either because my laptop was being wank, but from what I could see, Dzeko was completely inept - one of you said last night (can't remember who!) that Silva shooting from range looked like it was due to the fact he didn't want to pass to Dzeko.

Kolarov looked awful, and Yaya seemed to be a complete passenger. Despite his size, and the poor reviews from a lot of Gooners when we signed him, I really rate Clichy for us and he's got more of a tackle in him than Kolarov ever will.

I'm being cautious because I don't want to slag Mancini off, but I do think he has more to learn in the CL than probably any of the players. In some ways I think it's a shame we finished 3rd not 4th, the qualification games could have given us more experience.

Either way if we've dropped out because he doesn't see the CL as a priority then he's not gone about it the right way, dropping into the Europa League is of absolutely no benefit to us, I'd rather we lost the group and could focus domestically.

What really pissed me was the fact that it was so bleeding obvious that fullbacks overlapping would have had a field day and we failed to hurt them in this area,it was crying out for width for someone to feed Dzeko,we aren't asking for a bill shankly moment even alan ball would've spotted it.What do we pay balloon head platt for? He pisses me off more than anyone but I put it down to him not picking his dogs shit up when he's walking the horrible mutt.One day you'll see it in the papers - " David Platt attacked by stranger who told him he's a cunt" exclusive
Back to the prem on sunday,we'd better play better than last years Anfield game where we were outfought all over the pitch,funnily enough I blamed the platt tosser for that too,must get some counselling

I think that Mancini still has a lot to learn in Europe, we can not play the game we play in the PL because experienced teams in Europe will soak it up and hit us on the break, that is why we are doing so well in the PL and struggling in Europe, because we are too naive. However i do believe that we will learn and come back stronger. I too wish we were not in the europa league so we could concentrate on domestic matters.
I was amazed he did not take off Dzeko earlier to give Aguero a chance to get in the game, the time he had on the pitch was not enough to let him bed in and play his natural game, it was headless chicken time and not balanced play.
I honestly believe we will improve, but while i am not totally writing off our chances, my mind is concentrating on domestic issues and i would use the europa league to give the youngsters experience

Ever since I posted the team last night, I had an awful feeling. I posted that I thought both full-backs would be exploited for what they were - average players in the Prem, never mind CL players.

I'm not saying that both goals came from 'wing-play'...but Kolorov on the near post for the first just stood there....and why Kolorov and not Dzeko??

The second came from very sloppy play - which to be fair, happened all night. Never seen players like Kompany, Yaya and Silva give the ball away so much. It looked very lazy, as there was no movement up front from Dzeko, with Mario pulling out wide..........AND, the biggest culprit WAS Lescott...his distribution was fucking dire. He's been great for most of the season, but last night he was awful with the ball at his feet.

Silva ran out of ideas due to the lack of movement - so resorted to the one area of his game that really needs improving - shooting. For his class, he shoots like a Championship player.

Overall, it was pretty crap.....but IF we can see that, and i called for Barry to come in the second half for Dzeko, pushing Yaya further upfront (most on here called it at the time), Aguero to replace DeJong/Balotelli....Why the fuck couldn't Mancini see it?

That's what is really disappointing. His selection was shite right from the off. No pace at full-back, no bombing forward out wide - which we didn't have all night. Dzeko clearly needing more games...and all this IN A GAME WE NEEDED TO DRAW OR WIN.....and he waits until 9 minutes to go to do something about it.

Poor from Mancini - and let's hope it never happens again in the PL.

Roll on Sunday - and lets hope the team put last night behind them ASAP.

i don't blame JoLo at all. He has never been a 'distributor'. Mostly he just keeps it simple as passes the ball to his full back, VK or Barry/NDJ/Yaya.

To let Silva off for his shots because ' there was no movement' doesn't cut it with me. If there isn't a killer pass on, keep the ball. Why give it back so cheaply? Why take 3 players on in our own half? Yaya did that a few times as well.

We didn't keep the ball as well as we should have.

Kolarov has looked good when bombing forwards when we are all over teams.

Richards was a must for me last night, even though I love Zabba.

Listen to us all.... think back a few years, yes we have spent alot as the Spuds keep telling us but where we have come from to where we are now is unbelievable! Opinions are what keeps football intresting and different points of view. Mancini is working with our players day in day out and must of thought the squad he picked was good enough. I bet he is as dissapointed as the rest of us with certain players perfomances but it is a squad game and he has to rotate! Bring on the weekend and lets hope this nightmare of a game is forgotten but lessons learnt!

Fair enough - Steve Kean is a fucking legend then!!! Just the players letting him down, fuck all to do with his selection, all about the players.

Mancini can't get everything right.

There is that balancing act, playing a game every 3 or 4 days. He has to get it right between rotating some of the squad, introducing new/young players, looking out for injuries etc.

When has everyone agreed with what Bobby has done?

There is also that blind faith where he has bought someone and he is gonna stick with him (yaya& Dzeko).

Is Bobby the best manager out there? I don't think so. Is he good enough in the long run? probably.

I'll repeat what I said earlier, if we had Cavani instead of Dzeko we'd have cruised it regardless of how off colour some of our players were.

For me, as soon as you see Balotelli and Dzeko in the same starting eleven then you're in for a hard day. Not seen any evidence so far that those two have any chemistry as a front two.

Spot on comments about us needing width though (and Platt being a cunt).

I'm going to go away now - i clearly need to calm down over last night. Just re-read what i wrote after bellyblue's post and sarcasm doesn't help and wasn't meant. Sorry bellyblue.

Had a shit day, felt shit all day about the whole affair. Don't want to pick on Mancini, but feel it was his fault in such an important game.

Anyway - speak to you all soon.

No problem mate, never took it like that at all, cant disagree with most comments on here just think our passion gets in the way of reality!

Still sick as a chip but we've all been through worse!

i do agree that mancini didn't get the starting 11 right.

if we do get knocked out of the CL, i hope he treats the europa cup the same way as the league cup.

there may be the issue that we were counting on the extra cash from getting out of our group and we may have to try for the europa cup just for the money. i wouldn't be happy with that, rather we 'found' another sponsor for the missing dosh (if we need it for FFP).

Mancini played kolo (which I never rated) away against bayern after 6 months of no football! that was almost as bad as Hughes picking Silvinho against Lennon!

He didn't fucking learn for the Napoli game and picked a poor team, I seriously doubt old purple nose would have made this schoolboy error...

i agree PG, old purple nose would have picked a team to beat benfica at home...oh wait....

dawg, the manu players now are shit but I bet you if old piss had our team we would have made it past the group stages.

We might still make it past the group stages - but unlikely, I know.

The blame for Napoli lands on Mancini; he picked the wrong players for the CL... again. I couldn't understand the game we were playing, the tactics. We were constantly pressing & probing for space... and we didn't need to. We should've said to Napoli 'a point will do us, but you've got to win so come and have a go'. They played on the break like they did at ours - while I'm sat there expecting to see us sitting tight and daring them to come at us while we pick THEM off.

Apart from his distribution, Lescott was the pick of the defenders. Kompany always seemed to be stretching into challenges, like he was forever 2 yards off the pace. What's happened to him... Captain's Curse? Dzeko... I like the bloke but I just can't work that performance out. He was beyond woeful. Yaya did okay, in my opinion, worked hard, didn't hide, always asking for the ball. Likewise, Milner.

Sounds stupid but maybe the worst thing we did was equalise. Had we gone in 1-0 down at HT maybe Mancini would've made a couple of changes, one being Sergio who clearly should've been on the pitch on the hour mark at the very least. I'm wondering if it was pride on Bobbi's part, he hooked Johnson in the other game when he realised the team selection wasn't right - and I just wonder if he didn't want to be seen doing the same thing again with Dzeko.

That said, we created enough chances to come out of this with a point and they all fell to Mario. That's not a criticism; sometimes it happens, sometimes not. But it's important to remember that we've been below par in a few games but taken our chances. We didn't take them this time and that's all there is to it.

Felt we gave ball away way too easily and often in middle of the park all night. FB choice was of course inadequate (much as I love Zabba). But looking at chances could have been worse result, could have been better. One of those nights (which are more frequent and harder to blag at this level).