The view from the Lee
Accomplished Leicester win tells us more about Manchester City than 5-0 thumpings
Bernardo Silva, Manchester City
By Sam Lee Sept 12, 2021 16
When analysing Manchester City’s away win over Leicester on Saturday, it’s important to remember that Brendan Rodgers’ side normally have a knack of seeking out and ruthlessly exploiting any weaknesses in their illustrious opponents’ game plan.
Jamie Vardy is usually the human embodiment of that and if you looked at the eight goals he has scored in 10 games against Pep Guardiola’s side up to this weekend, you would notice, in every single clip, that he applies the finishing touches to devastating breaks, with Manchester City players desperately chasing back to cover mistakes higher up the pitch.
And while Vardy was a constant menace at the King Power Stadium, with his team still in the match right up until the final whistle, Guardiola’s men stood firm.
The 1-0 victory, then, perhaps tells us more about the defending Premier League champions than the back-to-back 5-0 home wins against Arsenal and Norwich.
It’s still early days in the season, we’re still working out how teams will look, and there are always going to be questions about City: do they have the hunger to retain their title? Do they have enough up front? Will they struggle with the counter-attack, as they did at the start of last season, or master it, like at the end of it?
Well, now we know a little more.
Whenever Leicester rampaged up their own pitch, and they did so plenty of times, it was usually because, quite simply, they had played brilliantly themselves, rather than preying on an error by their guests. Sometimes you can’t stop it, no matter how good you are.
When Harvey Barnes hit the crossbar with a header, for example. Jack Grealish had done his job, pressing and blocking off passing angles, and leaving Kasper Schmeichel with only one pass, but the Leicester goalkeeper executed it superbly. He found Marc Albrighton, who deftly flicked the ball around the corner.
Suddenly, Vardy was racing away down the right.
He played a fine pass to the back post and that’s where Barnes thrust his head at the ball. It wasn’t enough but had it been, you could not have pointed the finger at the team in white and said, “Oh, they messed that up.”
It felt like Leicester might nick something, Rodgers felt they deserved to afterwards, and their threat was constant. But, in truth, City generally dealt with it effectively and controlled a game at the King Power about as well as can be expected.
“It’s difficult when a team plays deep and doesn’t run. We need to be more patient, not chase the second, third goals. It’s tough. It’s not easy to accept, but we have to accept it.”
That was Guardiola’s assessment of the humbling 5-2 home defeat by Leicester at the very start of last season, when he said his players were too keen to add to their early 1-0 lead, thus leaving themselves open to the transition. Vardy ended up with a hat-trick.
“Be patient and attack in the right moments. We cannot win this game in 10 minutes. It needs 90, 95 minutes.”
That was Guardiola’s assessment of the 2-0 win here in April, when his team were completely transformed, barely conceding a chance all afternoon as they marched to the title.
That was never going to be the case yesterday. With fans in the stadium this time, it was always going to be a more boisterous affair.
Vardy did do his thing once. City lost the ball in midfield: the cardinal sin. One simple pass undid them and the veteran striker rounded Ederson, but he had gone a fraction too early and was offside.
But generally, Guardiola’s side stood up and came out with a win that cannot be judged as overly crucial in the title race at such an early stage, but one that suggests things are going well.
Aymeric Laporte fouls Leicester’s danger man Jamie Vardy (Photo: Marc Atkins/Getty Images)
“The big signal to be solid during a season is the way we play. The last three games, we were incredibly good and that’s why we are there,” Guardiola said on Saturday, reassured at what he has seen so far.
There was, in fairness, a bit of impatience in City’s game.
Guardiola occasionally looked baffled at Joao Cancelo’s choice of pass, the full-back occasionally selecting the more complicated option, which did allow Leicester a sniff of a break, and that’s often all they need.
If it wasn’t impatience, it was sloppiness, because City really could have scored more than once, particularly in the final minutes. Fernandinho burst into the box but, strangely, took on a shot himself when such a team player would so often pass. Grealish ran in one-on-one even later but took a couple of poor touches.
Before that, Ferran Torres showed that his conversion into a bona fide No 9 is a work in progress. One chance summed it up: he produced a fine run to get in behind and he was found expertly by Ilkay Gundogan but put his shot into the side netting.
He was replaced just after the hour with Raheem Sterling, a player Guardiola believes is just as capable as the Spaniard of playing as a striker — not on this occasion, but he looked better on the right wing late on.
Cancelo, despite his sometimes strange decision-making, defended well, as indeed did all of his colleagues. Occasionally City were bailed out by Ederson but that’s a goalkeeper’s job, after all. You need everybody in games like this.
For those little concerns about their finishing or fairly minor decision-making, City mastered a difficult game very well.
They played their usual, sophisticated football, trying to pull Leicester apart down the wings — because it was packed-out through the middle — and they created a bagful of chances, the usual type of City opportunities with players arriving at the back post.
But they didn’t go in.
Barring that Torres miss, they were not exactly wasteful (and, again, Leicester played their part by defending brilliantly) but they were not exactly clinical, either.
Guardiola had already decided to bring Sterling on, with Riyad Mahrez and the less game-ready Kevin De Bruyne and Phil Foden also in reserve, when Bernardo Silva popped up with the goal City needed on 62 minutes.
Cancelo struck a shot from outside the box (perhaps not the best option, again), Caglar Soyuncu got in the way, and the loose ball fell to Bernardo, who simply poked it in from close range — one of those where you instantly look to the referee’s assistant, because goals can’t be scored that easily, can they?
City often made it look difficult but this was exactly what they needed. If they can’t get the clinical finishes, they’ll take the scruffy ones.
Bernardo certainly enjoyed it, perhaps more so than any of his other City goals. He did want to leave this summer, as he did last year, but he’ll play his heart out while he’s here.
“It was an excellent performance,” Guardiola said. “The mentality of the players was incredible from the first minute to the end. We played an excellent, excellent game.”
And then there were the intangibles that we can take for granted: “After the international break, it is not one of the best places to come.”
Yet they came out unscathed.
Leicester could not exploit City’s weaknesses because there was not too much there to be exploited.
(Top photo: Nick Potts/PA Images via Getty Images)
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Sam Lee is the Manchester City correspondent for The Athletic. The 2020-21 campaign will be his sixth following the club, having previously held other positions with Goal and the BBC, and freelancing in South America. Follow Sam on Twitter @SamLee.
Would love someone, with more brain cells than me, to explain how how Grealish and Silva existed in that same left-side pocket for so much of the game, seemingly, without it looking awkward or ineffective.....?
Ryan T.
17h ago
15 likes
@Stevie G. Pep talks about it in his press conference. Basically you have the winger and one of the midfielders attack in tandem. One inverts and cuts inside (Grealish, right foot), the other makes runs to the byline with his strong foot (Bernardo, left foot).
The same can happen on the other side with Mahrez and D
by Pretty Boy Lee » Sun Sep 12, 2021 1:49 am 
