Man City's new philosophy and tactical touches from Pep Guardiola

When the big match between Man City and Liverpool ended with a score of 1-1, the Etihad stadium issued an announcement that divided public opinion: Jeremy Doku was voted the best player of the match.

First point of view, the decision of the organizing committee is completely correct. Doku is the main character on the left wing. Another match where the talented strategist Pep Guardiola's tactics are set up around the Belgian winger, so that this young talent receives as much ball as possible.

And when he has the ball, Doku often creates dangerous situations, such as 11 dribbles in the match against Liverpool. In the past two years, the Premier League has never seen a player successfully break through with the ball so many times.

The second view is the opposite, Doku cannot be the best player of the match. It is true that this winger plays explosively as mentioned, but also often loses the ball.

In the first half, Liverpool continuously organized quick attacks after winning the ball. The Kop had such opportunities to attack thanks to Doku continuously losing the ball after his efforts to create breakthroughs.

This is why these two opposing views make for such a fascinating topic. For those who think Doku was the best player on the pitch, the Belgian’s little possession-losses are probably not worth mentioning. Doku is a winger who is expected to make a difference with his dribbling ability, so losing possession is acceptable.

This view is true for the vast majority of teams but becomes interesting because the team in question is Man City, led by Guardiola, the most iconic of the control school of managers. Throughout his career, the Spaniard has created an image of a man obsessed with control.

Pep wants to control everything on the pitch, if possible. From ball control, control of the game, control of space, control of people to details such as the quality of the grass. "What I want, my desire, is to have 100% possession of the ball," Guardiola said in 2015, when he was leading Bayern Munich.

Despite winning 5-1 against Arsenal in the Champions League, the Spanish strategist often went "crazy" on the sidelines after his players easily lost the ball.

In addition, the immutable principle in Guardiola's view is that the ball always moves faster than any player. So he always values ​​​​passing over individual breakthrough efforts. But after 8 years, at the Etihad last weekend, Guardiola, who once craved control of the ball to the point of suffocation, was not annoyed by what Doku showed.

In fact, since the beginning of the season, Doku has become an important factor in the Man City squad, to the point that Guardiola is willing to bench Jack Grealish, a key factor in the journey to conquer the "treble" of the Premier League, FA Cup and Champions League last season.

Even in big matches that often see Guardiola show maximum caution, such as the big matches against Chelsea or Liverpool, he still trusts the young Belgian talent. The response is a goal, 5 assists and dozens of dribbles per match.

Doku could become a shining star in the Premier League. The young Belgian talent is the type of player who brings excitement to fans with his individual moves. Legend Thierry Henry, who knew Doku very well when he worked for the Belgian national team, once commented: "When you face him directly, the only thing you can do is pray."

This assessment partly reflects how good Doku's dribbling ability is. Statistics also show that Doku is the most dangerous dribbler in the Premier League this season. On average, the young Belgian talent makes 8.43 attempts to dribble past opponents every 90 minutes.

In recent years under Pep Guardiola, Man City have not had such a player. The contrast is evident in Grealish. The player in the same position as Doku only made 2.48 dribble attempts per 90 minutes.

So, the weekend's clash, or more broadly this season, Man City's transformation lies in a player like Doku. Pep Guardiola's men still played well against Liverpool and probably deserved to win. So at least for now, the reigning Premier League and Champions League champions have no shortcomings that need to be improved.

The story here is about Guardiola’s transformation. The Spaniard is always thinking of new ideas. Last season, for example, it was John Stones’s half-back position. This season, it is about trading possession time to make room for adventurous players like Doku.

In the Premier League, Man City still have the highest possession rate. However, in the Pep Guardiola era, The Citizens have never had less possession than this season.

Is Guardiola opting for a more chaotic approach, based on moving the ball forward more quickly and expecting the attackers to create havoc in the penalty area? The answer is both yes and no.

The answer is yes, because football is changing. Guardiola has spent his career seeking control, but the increasing ability of teams to mark and press has created new problems.

Pep's positional play, or passing that stretches the opposition defence to break through, risks becoming predictable if Man City's passes don't create space. Individual breakthroughs can make the difference.

Coach Unai Emery once shared his opinion on this issue as follows: "Teams tend to be man-to-man all over the pitch when they don't have the ball. This forces the teams in possession to adapt. The way they attack will be different when facing opponents using zonal defense and man-to-man defense."

Mikel Arteta used this tactic and surprised Guardiola in the FA Cup last season. "I didn't expect the opponent to choose such a brave approach. The one-on-one tactics caused us a lot of difficulties," Guardiola shared after the match, certainly not forgetting this painful lesson.

That may have prompted the Spaniard to change his approach to squad building in the summer transfer window, with the awareness of the need for players with breakthrough potential giving Doku his chance at the Etihad.

On the other hand, personnel changes forced Guardiola to adapt to the risk of losing control of the game. For example, the first half of the match against Liverpool, or the unbelievable 4-4 draw with Chelsea.

In the match against Liverpool, Guardiola filled the bench with 8 players, including 2 goalkeepers, the player who had just recovered from injury and was not ready to play, John Stones, 2 defenders, Kalvin Phillips and 2 young talents who grew up from the academy.

It's not that these players are bad, but there's no one on the bench of quality enough for Pep to be ready to deploy a possession-based strategy.

In the starting lineup, standing above the "anchor" Rodri are Bernardo Silva, Julian Alvarez, Phil Foden, Erling Haaland and Doku. Most of these players are inclined to attack, playing direct football, with Doku being a typical example. Therefore, the match is no longer tight in the direction of control.

Without Bernardo Silva skillfully linking the midfield and the frontline, the first half could have been even more chaotic. Stones and Grealish are injured, Ilkay Gundogan and Riyad Mahrez have moved on, and losing Bernardo Silva would have had a huge impact on City's control.

It's a matter of personnel, the players decide the outcome of the game. If Grealish replaces Doku, Gundogan replaces Alvarez, the game will be very different. Man City will have more passes, slower attacks and can control the game more.

Guardiola still wants to control the game as much as possible, but in his current personnel situation, he has to use players who are more capable of creating chances than holding the ball.

The Spaniard's previous formations have always been about balance, with Kevin De Bruyne's attacking instincts tempered by the ball-holding abilities of David Silva, and later Bernardo Silva and Gundogan.

The problem only arises when the team is unbalanced. While De Bruyne is undoubtedly a master playmaker, it is impossible to have three players like the Belgian in the same team. Guardiola, or any other manager, needs a different type of player to create balance.

Similarly, Silva, Gundogan and Grealish are excellent, but they need to be accompanied by players who can create momentum for the attack with their ability to create breakthroughs. So the problem at the moment is that Man City's squad is unbalanced, with too many direct and breakthrough players but not enough ball-holding players.

Of course, a good coach is one who not only leaves his mark on his personal philosophy but also knows how to adapt to every situation. Guardiola is a good coach. He adapts to the personnel situation by approaching the game more directly, instead of being conservative in possession of the ball with players who are not good at keeping the ball.

Once their ball-playing specialists return from injury, City will be less direct and more like they used to be. But even so, the fast-paced attacking style has become a tactical option that the Blues have mastered and is an option for Guardiola to use when needed.

Overall, Pep may be able to exploit Doku’s breakthrough ability in a slower, more steady and balanced way, similar to how he managed to integrate the almost one-touch Erling Haaland into Man City’s possession-based formation last season.

In fact, to make room for Haaland, Guardiola has accepted to lose some control of the game. To put that in perspective, the Spanish coach previously deployed 11 players who were all capable of passing the ball to overwhelm the opponent in terms of ball possession time. Using the Norwegian striker, Pep has only 10 players left.

With De Bruyne out injured, Guardiola opted for Julian Alvarez, another direct player. This meant he was willing to compromise on his ball-holding ability. As a result, Man City's possession rate dropped from 68.2% in 2021-22 to 65.2% in 2022-23.

This season, with Doku's presence, Man City "lost" nearly 3% more ball possession time, down to 62.5%, as mentioned the lowest in the Pep Guardiola era at Etihad.

In short, due to the change of times, from tactics to people, Guardiola is no longer the Guardiola with the desire to control the ball 100%. But most importantly, Man City is still a terrifying destructive machine.

That shows that the Spanish strategist is increasingly experienced and continues to think constantly. That is why he has been at the top of football for more than ten years.

Content: Ngoc Trung

Design: Patrick Nguyen

12/01/2023 - 06:35

Source: https://dantri.com.vn/the-thao/triet-ly-moi-cua-man-city-va-net-cham-pha-chien-thuat-tu-pep-guardiola-20231129190431515.htm