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Well Mancini has apparently said we havent been working well in training either! Somebody on BMoan last week said he knows one of the players and had been told training was crap on one day last week!

I would certainly be interested if Mancini elaborated on his comment. Maybe it gives me more licence to comment more on the negative aspects of what I see? Ok probably not but for me it is a strange thing for him to say and I would not be surprised if photographers turn up from now trying to get pictures of something in training they can highlight as poor.

I did think there was a different tone or something in his after match interview. Something that suggested he is a bit taken aback by the weaknesses being shown and that he really will have to do/try something different. We shall see.

I don't know how training works on this level Doug, but often I read your reports and think 'they didn't work on that for long'. In todays report there was a bit you put about some being taken away for five minutes then some swapped five minutes later. Five minutes don't seem a long time, once youv'e talked through tactics and sorted the group out. How long in total does training last??? Also after (or before) are they inside doing fitness work / gym??

Maybe we should spend a week floating corners and free kicks into the box and organising our defensive set up.

What I do get from you Doug is that Mancini is very hands on in training, more so than Hughes who delegated quite a lot Niedwiezki. He seems very focused on the details.

There was definitely something different about Mancini in that interview.

He looked like keegan did leading up to the bolton game.

Someone made a reasonable point on the radio over the weekend - we're rubbish at scoring from corners/set pieces. If you therefore set up our defence against it in training, whatever the system, it wouldn't leak many goals.

Does this therefore lead us into a false sense of security, which has been exploited pretty well over the last month?

For me this is where Bobby has to earn his crust and show he is a top manager.

Bacon,Ancelotti and Wenger have all had rough patches and come through,Bobby has seen the team has a few weaknesses and he HAS to come up with a solution or our season will go to rat shit.

I hope he comes through for everyones sake.

May be he knows the special one is on his way?

Douglas Higginbottom wrote:Well Mancini has apparently said we havent been working well in training either! Somebody on BMoan last week said he knows one of the players and had been told training was crap on one day last week!

I would certainly be interested if Mancini elaborated on his comment. Maybe it gives me more licence to comment more on the negative aspects of what I see? Ok probably not but for me it is a strange thing for him to say and I would not be surprised if photographers turn up from now trying to get pictures of something in training they can highlight as poor.

I did think there was a different tone or something in his after match interview. Something that suggested he is a bit taken aback by the weaknesses being shown and that he really will have to do/try something different. We shall see.

Presumably he see's things you don't, especially when they are indoors or behind the curtain or when you don't go. Just hope he knows how to solve the problem from within his vast experience as a top class manager who has been a winner every where he has been. Maybe back to the iron fist it was often suggested was his chosen training method, which we don't hear about anymore

There is bound to be a load of thinking ,talking,planning that goes on inside before and after any training I see.Plus of course I don't see it all anyway.
But yes Mancini is very hands on with everything that happens.I would say it is pretty well 100% of all tactical stuff on the training pitch is run by Mancini. Eddie Niedzvicki did lots of the hands on stuff supported by Bowen and with Hughes mostly ( not solely) on the side watching closely and interjecting as and when.

On the point about them not doing things for a very long at a time that's true.Say they are going to work at defending a corner Mancini might take a few minutes, say 4 or 5 tops, basically placing each defender where he wants them to start. If they are a yard or so out of position he will step in and move them that yard. Then and only then will somebody take the corner for them to defend against.Usually they will only sling over 4 or 5 and maybe do it from both sides. AND the other point I have mentioned before is that they don't usually have attackers against them trying to score. Some times they do but more often than not it's just a defence.

I think I asked the question a month or so back wondering what Big Fat Sam does in training re set pieces as we so often here they will practice them all week.I wonder.

As for how long training lasts. It varies of course and will I am sure depend on how many games they have played or when the next one is etc etc.On some days they have done close to 2 hour sessions and others may only be an hour but 90 minutes is fairly normal.And of course i have said before that the notion that they often do 2 sessions a day is a myth. Pre season or very earlys eason maybe but not since.

I think the amount of changes to the back 4 must surely make it more difficult to get used to set piece routines in particular. In the old days you had a back 4 & a few subs. Utd & Chelsea still do when everyone is fit. They change for games against weaker teams but in proper games it's just one change here & there to rest someone, but that's AFTER they've spent literally years, building a solid back 4. Even then it can still go to shit from time to time, so what chance have we got when we effectively juggle 8 players around?

It's one thing doing it on the training ground but we have a situation where if a player does it right or wrong in a game, he may not play in the next one anyway, so as a unit on the pitch, we neither learn from our mistakes or successes.

Simple things like holding a good line are made difficult when one or both of the fullbacks change every game, then one of the CBs changes in the next one etc. It's more like an international side's situation than a club one.

Ted Hughes wrote: It's more like an international side's situation than a club one.

interesting point...we're playing like some underachieving national team. a bunch of fuclin strangers out there most of the time lately. Even stil, there were a few moments of genuine quality on Wednesday that really got me excited. i hope Mancini can sort this challenge.

WRT OD's assessment of how Mancini looked in his post match -- i agree, he sounded like a dead-man walking. I didn't like it. "is not normal."

cheers

I took the interview that he was exasperated that the team had managed to pull a draw out from a win. I felt the same way.

I think the point should be made that the players are all experienced pros, most of whom have been playng the game under the guidance of coaches for many years. They will have been training and learning their trade almost daily for a number of years and much of what goes on in training should be second nature to them.
There shouldn't be that much about football, individual skills and positioning that Mancini should have to teach them. Such basic stuff as keeping a line is done proficiently by many amateur and Sunday league teams, it should be almost instinctive in a professional.
All Mancini should have to do is fine tune the machine. Ensure that problems a put right and work on strategies and tactics particular to City and the opponents we are playing.
Watching defenders stand still and not block runs as has happened recentlyis basic stuff that should have been taught at a much earlier stage in their careers. Pub team defenders are expected to do that.

dazby wrote:I took the interview that he was exasperated that the team had managed to pull a draw out from a win. I felt the same way.

Me too, but his exasperation is confusing. His idiotic contract for Vieira, the signing and playing of shite like Boateng, the woeful peformances of players like Milner, failing to drop his 'keeper, changing to a more negative tactic after 10 minutes of total domination, etc, etc, etc. If he can't see the many mistakes he is making, he's in big bother.

I don't think there's anything sinister about his disappointment; we've just blown the title against a side who played no better than West Brom or Wigan; games we won comfortably. Barring Yaya Toure, we started with Bob's full team; the one he's been planning for & assembling since he arrived. Every one of his 1st choice 11 was fit bar Yaya, everyone has been drilled on the training ground, loads of work has been put into chasing & signing those players, loads of money spent on them & they only play for ten minutes then turn into West Ham.

He will have been thinking we were nearly there, a couple of signings away from winning the league. On that showing we were ten signings away. He's gutted, like we were, to see his team play like shit. It's good to see he's not happy & isn't accepting it.

s1ty m wrote:

dazby wrote:I took the interview that he was exasperated that the team had managed to pull a draw out from a win. I felt the same way.

Me too, but his exasperation is confusing. His idiotic contract for Vieira, the signing and playing of shite like Boateng, the woeful peformances of players like Milner, failing to drop his 'keeper, changing to a more negative tactic after 10 minutes of total domination, etc, etc, etc. If he can't see the many mistakes he is making, he's in big bother.

I wouldn't call the contract with Vieira 'Idiotic', not at all. However, I think even Roberto now realises that even Patrick has had his day. I felt that Patrick has offered a lot of experience and he is a very calm influence on the younsters, probably more so off he pitch than on. I think from now on he will get much less time and he probably doesn't mind that either. The exasperation in his expression when the ref gave that absolute shit decision for the penalty was for all to see. I'm sure Roberto will tell him too, that it's pretty much time to nail his boots to the wall.

What is however more distressing is that Barry has been so quiet in recent games. Against Villa at home Roberto said before the game that both Barry and Milner were up for the game and he promptly left them both on the bench! Then at Villa , recently Barry was a shadow of the player we saw before Christmas. It's as if he knows he's on the way out in the summer ( the way he is currently performing). Also we had Teves running all over the place on Wednesday, I can't imagine that was planned either and more importantly his passing was way off most of the time . He also tended to dribble instead of passing on occasions.

So just maybe the things that get said and done in training are being ignored by some of the players. Doug watches them train, but none of us are partial to what gets said in the dressing room or at the hotels in their match preparations.

Going one up so early I thought that this was going to be the day we take a team to the cleaners. However lack of concentration on Micahs behalf , played them all onside for the first goal. ( Holding the line is so important, like john68 says
pub teams can do this , so how come the profis can't ?). It is that simple.

Of course if Kola's late free kick had gone in , perhaps we wouldn't scrutinise everything like now. Those were two points to be had. Add it to the Sunderland result when Bent got the penalty ( and Teves's sitter !) and to Nigels unlucky deflection at Villa recently , that's a good six points we might have had ( 3 + 1 +2 more at brum).

Still, this season is going down to the wire for us, so we should be pleased about the fact that we still have a lot to play for.

zuricity wrote:So just maybe the things that get said and done in training are being ignored by some of the players. Doug watches them train, but none of us are partial to what gets said in the dressing room or at the hotels in their match preparations.

Going one up so early I thought that this was going to be the day we take a team to the cleaners. However lack of concentration on Micahs behalf , played them all onside for the first goal. ( Holding the line is so important, like john68 says
pub teams can do this , so how come the profis can't ?). It is that simple.

I doubt if Doug will have seen Mancini giving Tevez strict instructions about that.

Re holding the line etc, I referred to it in an earlier post; if you keep swapping players, you'll struggle to have a solid back 4. Before Micah did that, Kolarov did an even worse one in open play which led to a Brum runner being totally free on goal if they'd got a simple pass right. It was like Huddersfield in their 1-10 at Maine Rd. Jerome was winning header after header & should have scored, not because he suddenly became Joe Royle in the air but because nobody picked him up.

When Micah played them onside, who was in charge of the line? Did anyone even bother to look to remind everyone to be careful? They all did what they always do; watched the ball. If they were a settled back 4 they would all be shouting at each other & if it happened, there'd be an inquest & big barney after the game.

Fooitballers can't be trusted to do their jobs defending at anything btw, you have to brainwash them & it often takes time & a settled defence. We've had the time but not the settled defence.

Sorry been gone a while, back now.

I am not an expert on the technical side of football, but have been around
sports long enough to know that the three things that make or break a team are; coaching, communication and motivation. The last two are really one and the same.

Mancini has always been considered a great tactician and I have never seen Doug post a training report where he isn't involved with the squad.

Communication and Motivation may Mancini's major problems.

The team has played well for short periods of time but then seem to flake and break down for large chunks of time. Yes, we don't see the inner workings of the team, player meetings or coaching sessions. But the player's should have the cohesion and experience to keep a consistent level of performance by now (minus the ordinary wear and tear.)

The teams of the highest competition are clubs like the Scum, Chelsea or Arsenal, whether in a knockout competition or in a league tie breaker, they have a the mindset to match their ability. Sadly, they have that edge over us. The removal of that hated sign at The Swamp will remove that edge and level the psychological playing field.

What more can you do but beat our players, collectively, with one big tire iron??

I believe with all my heart that no individual microscopic dissection by us will correct the equation. Management has spent the time and money to assemble a team where the proper coaching, communication and motivation of the players will not equal success.
Mancini has worked under difficult circumstances before under great pressure; so when he comments to the camera about a shitty practice, maybe he should look into a mirror instead.

Only he knows the answer to his problem.

P.S. Sorry if my reply is too over reaching to be off the mark! I am doing my best.

Ted Hughes wrote:

zuricity wrote:So just maybe the things that get said and done in training are being ignored by some of the players. Doug watches them train, but none of us are partial to what gets said in the dressing room or at the hotels in their match preparations.

Going one up so early I thought that this was going to be the day we take a team to the cleaners. However lack of concentration on Micahs behalf , played them all onside for the first goal. ( Holding the line is so important, like john68 says
pub teams can do this , so how come the profis can't ?). It is that simple.

I doubt if Doug will have seen Mancini giving Tevez strict instructions about that.

Re holding the line etc, I referred to it in an earlier post; if you keep swapping players, you'll struggle to have a solid back 4. Before Micah did that, Kolarov did an even worse one in open play which led to a Brum runner being totally free on goal if they'd got a simple pass right. It was like Huddersfield in their 1-10 at Maine Rd. Jerome was winning header after header & should have scored, not because he suddenly became Joe Royle in the air but because nobody picked him up.

When Micah played them onside, who was in charge of the line? Did anyone even bother to look to remind everyone to be careful? They all did what they always do; watched the ball. If they were a settled back 4 they would all be shouting at each other & if it happened, there'd be an inquest & big barney after the game.

Fooitballers can't be trusted to do their jobs defending at anything btw, you have to brainwash them & it often takes time & a settled defence. We've had the time but not the settled defence.

I still don't think the problem for that first goal was Micah not holding the line. A free kicj from that angle should never be allowed to reah the keeper.They practice/train with a player in that line every day but for some reason for that free kick nobody was there.

People have complained about the fact that there isn't a settled defence. Mancini seems to have chopped and changed things for two reasons.

First, he feels he can't keep asking the same players to play twice a week time after time and get the best out of them.

Second he seems to have been genuinely in doubt as to what his first choice back four should be. He clearly believes that Vinnie should be there and I thought he saw Kolo as his first choice partner; until Wednesday when a fit Kolo was left out in favour of Boateng. At left back Kolarov is clearly his pick because he values his willingness and ability to get forward and provide some width. At right back he seems to be torn between Zabaleta and Micah. Frankly a lot of people on this site feel the same. There's been quite a lot of slanging about Micah and Zaba praising followed by Micah being a little over praised for a very good performance against Notts County.So I can see why Mancini has made changes but he's paid to be decisive and in my view he's dithered at times. We're allowed to chop and change on this site; he's paid to make decisions.

The other question is whether the defensive system has worked very well. Since we have a lot of tall strong players that would suggest that we could do very well marking man to man. Maybe he will look at changing to that system.

There has also been talk of a lack of leadership on the pitch which does seem to be an issue. I'm genuinely surprised that Vinnie couldn't step up to the plate and take that on himself. Even if Tevez is notional captain for reasons which we know, Mancini really should encourage Vinnie to take on the leadership role. That means looking across the line and doing lots of shouting.

Finally it is true that Hart does seem to be suffering a dip in confidence which must be partly due to the lack of organisation in front of him. Personally I don't see Given as the answer. He's not the most confident with crosses either let's face it. GIven should, however, be given the Cup matches so that Joe doesn't get too comfortable.

Really we have a good defensive shape with two defensive midfielders in front of some talented footballers. They're far better than they've looked recently. It really shouldn't be beyond Mancini to get better performances out of them individually and collectively. It's time he pulled his finger out as he has admitted himself.