***Manchester City v Reading PREVIEW***
Posted: Fri Dec 21, 2012 10:30 pmAs per Dazby's post in the volunteer thread if anyone fancies having a turn please don't feel free to do so (I'm hoping to get another writing project off the ground) :
[center]Manchester City v Reading
Saturday 22nd December 2012
Etihad Stadium 3pm ko
Referee: Mike Dean
[youtube]07-87KYV3p4[/youtube][/center]
Last Saturday Whisky Companies recorded a massive spike in slaes before 3pm in City of Newcastle. Fortunately for Daily Mail readers this wasn’t a surge in binge drinking but the Geordie Nation walking out of St James Park and drowning their sorrows and steadying their nerves after getting away with a 3-1 home defeat as for only the second or third time this season City dominated a game.
The next day instead of headlines about how a captain-less, injury plagued side missing two-thirds of the midfield, with 2 more injuries in the game, went to the home of a Champions League pretender and dominated apparently just don’t sell newspapers. The lies printed the next day trying to unsettle Sergio, Mario, Nasri, Lescott, Kolarov, the manager and the board was nothing short of criminal. The ministry of Truth would be proud.
I thought the back line was terrific last week; I was worried about Kolo against Ba and Cisse but he marshalled the back line well, weather the storm in the second half and looked close to being the Kolo Toure who first arrived from Arsenal.
Nastasic continues to improve; he looks completely unfazed by the Premier League and this is just the beginning.
Joe made a couple of decent saves and showed real bravery after getting clattered twice punching the ball out.
Clichy put in a good shift as always, his ability to get up and down the field makes a massive difference, and Gutierrez was virtually anonymous. He must have read last weeks preview because HE ACTUALLY BLOCKED A CROSS! He was superb.
In midfield I thought Nasri had one his best games for City until he was forced off with injury (I’ve never seen someone subbed after taking on the nads before). The entire first half was Nasri passing inside to one of Silva, Tevez or Sergio in the final third and Newcastle simply couldn’t handle him.
Yaya Toure led by example in the middle of the park and was close to returning to the player that the rest of the league is terrified is. The pass to Nasri for the first goal was of such class that if it had been Tom Cleverley the Sun would have printed a centre page poster the next day.
Javi Garcia started slowly and if he had been taken off after 70 minutes I’d have said he’d done very little aside from the terrific header from the goal but in the last 20 minutes made a couple of very important interceptions.
Can someone tell me some new superlatives to describe Silva’s performance? Silvarrific? WE ACTUALLY SCORED FROM ONE OF HIS CORNERS!
Up front Sergio and Carlos were simply unplayable. On Friday the Guardian named Tevez as the 48th best player in the world currently which must mean there are 47 unreal footballers out there. The work rate, movement and energy he’s gave leading the front line will be giving the Newcastle back line queasy stomachs for weeks. Could someone explain how being elbowed in the face is a foul? Sergio scored a goal, could have had a dozen more and looked closer to the real thing than he has done in weeks.
All in all it was a terrific team performance and one of the most enjoyable in recent memory. Even if on the superstition front I had to keep my feet in the same position for most of the second half.
[center]Pablo Zabaleta
I bet you thought I wasn't going to mention him…[/center]
In my opinion he had a very difficult task when he arrived from Espanyol as the replacement for a very classy Vedran Corluka. The first year I think the pace of the Premier League surprised him and what was interpreted as mis-placed aggression was actually a combination of naivety and mis-placed enthusiasm.
In that first season (2008/09) he made 28 league appearances and showed his versatility with productive spell in midfield at a time when we would play a 5 man midfield that included 2 holding midfield players (Kompany being the other until De Jong arrived). His first season was topped off with a fabulous winning goal at home to Wigan (memorable for Richard Dunne for being sent off for kicking Amir Zaki)
[center][youtube]lUrVaiscO1I[/youtube]
That goal for the record[/center]
He was a player signed the day before the Sheik’s millions arrived and when a new manager arrived mid way through the following season, after many star players had been signed, he must have feared that his days may have been numbered but more expensive and marquee signings have come and gone since and despite some issues with disciplinary under that first half season under Mancini (9 yellows and 1 red) he made an impression on the Italian with his ultra-commitment and professionalism. This has not got un-noticed by the supporters.
Originally a Didsbury resident everything Zabba has ever given has been to the team and his put body, and forehead, on the line. In 2011 Pablo finished the season with an FA Cup winners medal, made 45 league & cup appearances, collected 11 bookings, 1 red, 21 stitches and had his nose broken. Since Mancini has arrived Zabaleta has signed 2 new contracts that will see him stay at the club until at least 2015.
[center]
24 caps and counting…[/center]
Last season the man from Buenos Aires found his playing time limited at the start thanks to the fine performances of Micah Richards but when he was called to action he put in such stellar performances that Micah was forced to watch the final games of last season from the bench.
This season he’s been aided by having started 11 of City’s 17 league games Zabba’s taken his performances to a new level. On Sunday at St James Park he was simply terrific. He was all over the place, covering, pressing the opposition and both his tackling and passing in the final third was excellent.
The word hero and legend is often bandied about too freely in the modern football era. Zabaleta seems to embody the spirit of the clubs support in one player; passionate, mad, committed, crazy, committed, loyal and a Champion all in one.
[center]The Royals
[/center]
We’ve had few modern meetings with Reading and only 16 league encounters in our history.
Reading are another of the clubs that we played in our single season in England’s third tier that we’ve met since in the Premier League ( joining Fulham, Wigan, Stoke, Blackpool & Burnley). They came down with us finishing bottom, moving from Elm Park to the Madesjki Stadium the following year. They, like everyone else, saw City as they’re cup final causing the game to kick off 30 minutes late due to traffic. We beat them comfortably on the day on our way to promotion, having been held 0-0 at home, and they finished comfortably 11th in mid table whilst we went on our roller coaster up the leagues.
Several years since…
It seems a lifetime ago since we last played Reading in the Premier League. They came up in 06/07 and beat us on a Monday Night game in August after we threw the kitchen sink at them. In the return game they were hailed as the model run modern club as Leroy Lita and Steve Sidwell made us look like mugs. The following season it took a 94th minute Stephen Ireland winner to beat them after we again had thrown the kitchen sink at them. In the return game at the Madejski, on a day when most trains were cancelled and City fans were forced to cram onto trains with the women off to the Crufts dog show on the train, City put in quite simply their worst performance in modern history going down 2-0 without a fight in a game that in my opinion singled the end for Sven Goran Eriksson.
[center][youtube]1mGhAP5UmOY[/youtube]
I’d completely forgotten about the FA Cup QF. Other than the atmosphere and the novelty of a 4.45pm KO on a Sunday it was a bit of a blur.[/center]
So its Champions versus Champions this week thanks to the turn around in Readings’ fortune that saw them lose just 4 of their last 25 games, winning 20 of them and win the Football League Championship (its proper name).
The manager Brian McDermott is no Harry Redknapp when it comes to the media love in and just gets on with the job. He’s turned down bigger jobs to stay and finish the job at Reading and keeps such a low profile that when Reading reserves played a behind closed doors friendly in the week he couldn’t get in to watch.
It was an understated summer for the Royals as they chose to bank the TV millions and add only Bosman signings to the squad that won the league. Former Liverpool, Bolton and Newcastle midfield Danny Guthrie was the first to arrive, then the highly thought off Pavel Pogrebynak turned down the chance to remain at Fulham to coincidentally sign for a club with a Russian owner. Former promising left back and ‘England International’ Nicky Shorey returned to the club, Stuart Taylor (also won more league titles than Robin Van Persie) signed for Reading twice according to Wikipedia and Welsh international full back Chris Gunter was the only man they parted with a fee for (£2.3m from Forest).
I’ve seen very little of Reading this year other than the first half an hour against United. I thought Jason Roberts put on a masterclass of the tall striker against a weak goalkeeper and questionable centre half. The crowning moment being Patrice Evra complaining that he was blocking Lindegaard at a corner, only for the Danish keeper to try and grab hold of him, after the ref had stopped the game to have words, and be caught in no mans land as Le Fondre fired home a header.
Unfortunately after half an hour United realised it was only Jason Roberts and put Reading to the sword convincingly.
In goal they’ve deviated between Adam Federici and Alex McCarthy in goal. The basic make up of all Premier League goalkeepers is that you are a good shot stopper but Federici is the exception that proves the rule. He’s seemed to have gifted someone a goal in every fixture I’ve seen. Against United it was one of the most truly awful goalkeeping performances I’d ever seen.
I like to think I’m knowledgeable about football but other than Nicky Shorey I’ve genuinely never heard of the rest of the back line that is likely to play and feel less than qualified to comment.
The centre of midfield will consist of Jay Tabb, who forced Rafael to be substituted after half an hour, and ex-Palace and QPR man Mikele Leigterwood. On the left hand side of midfield they have youth graduate Hal Robson-Kanu and on the right it will most likely be London club collecter Jobi McAnuff. There is the potential for Guthrie or Brynjar Gunnarsson into the middle instead.
Up front Pavel Pogrebnyak has 5 goals from 14 games and will most likely start with ex-Rochdale and Stockport man Adam Le Fondre who arrived from Rotherham last season. Options include Jason Roberts as the classic big man we struggle against or 35 goals in 148 games Noel Hunt (no relation to Stephen Hunt).
[center]City
[/center]
The injury list according to the Guardian:
Doubtful Kompany (groin)
Injured Nasri (groin, 29 Dec), Balotelli (illness, 29 Dec), Richards (knee, Jan), Rodwell (hamstring, Jan), Kolarov (groin, unknown)
If there is ever a game it’s not necessary to risk Kompany for it will be this one. There are plenty of fixtures over the Christmas period and Kolo Toure’s fine form over the last week should have instilled the confidence in Mancini that he can hopefully cope with Pogrebynak. The back 5 should pick itself but Reading like to play with a lot of width so we must BLOCK THOSES CROSSES!
In midfield it’s completely different from last week when the decision was whether we had to pick Sinclair or Garcia and hope for the best. Although Nasri looks like he’s out after taking one in the brains last week, again he’s not one worth risking, but it does mean that Milner should join Barry back in the team as he will also look to get whatever he can out of Yaya before the African Cup of Nations. Silva should be too much for Reading to handle and I can’t imagine him resting him.
Up front I’d start with Aguero and Tevez, they’re both playing themselves back into form at the moment and they’ve started to link well together and I’ve got them both in my fantasy team. If we play anything like we did last week we could break the Premier League record for most goals in a game Reading are that wide open at the back. I didn’t read anything about Mario’s tribunal in the week but I wouldn’t dream of starting him tomorrow (Premierleague.com says he will miss out with a virus) , there’s something wrong there and more than anything he needs to EARN his place in the team. Dzeko must start from the bench.
[center]Prediction:[/center]
Reading have lost their last 6 in a row and have even managed to replace QPR at the bottom of the table. Away from home they’ve drawn 2 and lost 7 of 9 fixtures, scored just 7 times but conceded just 17 (United have conceded 14) which means that Reading won’t be selling out their allocation tomorrow.
As always if we play to our best we’ll win but if we do this week we’ll break a scoring record or two. I really think we’re coming into form at the right time but we must take the game seriously and not feel the need to rest or rotate the squad.
2-1. Don't ask.
[center]Manchester City v Reading
Saturday 22nd December 2012
Etihad Stadium 3pm ko
Referee: Mike Dean
[youtube]07-87KYV3p4[/youtube][/center]
Last Saturday Whisky Companies recorded a massive spike in slaes before 3pm in City of Newcastle. Fortunately for Daily Mail readers this wasn’t a surge in binge drinking but the Geordie Nation walking out of St James Park and drowning their sorrows and steadying their nerves after getting away with a 3-1 home defeat as for only the second or third time this season City dominated a game.
The next day instead of headlines about how a captain-less, injury plagued side missing two-thirds of the midfield, with 2 more injuries in the game, went to the home of a Champions League pretender and dominated apparently just don’t sell newspapers. The lies printed the next day trying to unsettle Sergio, Mario, Nasri, Lescott, Kolarov, the manager and the board was nothing short of criminal. The ministry of Truth would be proud.
I thought the back line was terrific last week; I was worried about Kolo against Ba and Cisse but he marshalled the back line well, weather the storm in the second half and looked close to being the Kolo Toure who first arrived from Arsenal.
Nastasic continues to improve; he looks completely unfazed by the Premier League and this is just the beginning.
Joe made a couple of decent saves and showed real bravery after getting clattered twice punching the ball out.
Clichy put in a good shift as always, his ability to get up and down the field makes a massive difference, and Gutierrez was virtually anonymous. He must have read last weeks preview because HE ACTUALLY BLOCKED A CROSS! He was superb.
In midfield I thought Nasri had one his best games for City until he was forced off with injury (I’ve never seen someone subbed after taking on the nads before). The entire first half was Nasri passing inside to one of Silva, Tevez or Sergio in the final third and Newcastle simply couldn’t handle him.
Yaya Toure led by example in the middle of the park and was close to returning to the player that the rest of the league is terrified is. The pass to Nasri for the first goal was of such class that if it had been Tom Cleverley the Sun would have printed a centre page poster the next day.
Javi Garcia started slowly and if he had been taken off after 70 minutes I’d have said he’d done very little aside from the terrific header from the goal but in the last 20 minutes made a couple of very important interceptions.
Can someone tell me some new superlatives to describe Silva’s performance? Silvarrific? WE ACTUALLY SCORED FROM ONE OF HIS CORNERS!
Up front Sergio and Carlos were simply unplayable. On Friday the Guardian named Tevez as the 48th best player in the world currently which must mean there are 47 unreal footballers out there. The work rate, movement and energy he’s gave leading the front line will be giving the Newcastle back line queasy stomachs for weeks. Could someone explain how being elbowed in the face is a foul? Sergio scored a goal, could have had a dozen more and looked closer to the real thing than he has done in weeks.
All in all it was a terrific team performance and one of the most enjoyable in recent memory. Even if on the superstition front I had to keep my feet in the same position for most of the second half.
[center]Pablo Zabaleta
I bet you thought I wasn't going to mention him…[/center]
In my opinion he had a very difficult task when he arrived from Espanyol as the replacement for a very classy Vedran Corluka. The first year I think the pace of the Premier League surprised him and what was interpreted as mis-placed aggression was actually a combination of naivety and mis-placed enthusiasm.
In that first season (2008/09) he made 28 league appearances and showed his versatility with productive spell in midfield at a time when we would play a 5 man midfield that included 2 holding midfield players (Kompany being the other until De Jong arrived). His first season was topped off with a fabulous winning goal at home to Wigan (memorable for Richard Dunne for being sent off for kicking Amir Zaki)
[center][youtube]lUrVaiscO1I[/youtube]
That goal for the record[/center]
He was a player signed the day before the Sheik’s millions arrived and when a new manager arrived mid way through the following season, after many star players had been signed, he must have feared that his days may have been numbered but more expensive and marquee signings have come and gone since and despite some issues with disciplinary under that first half season under Mancini (9 yellows and 1 red) he made an impression on the Italian with his ultra-commitment and professionalism. This has not got un-noticed by the supporters.
Originally a Didsbury resident everything Zabba has ever given has been to the team and his put body, and forehead, on the line. In 2011 Pablo finished the season with an FA Cup winners medal, made 45 league & cup appearances, collected 11 bookings, 1 red, 21 stitches and had his nose broken. Since Mancini has arrived Zabaleta has signed 2 new contracts that will see him stay at the club until at least 2015.
[center]
24 caps and counting…[/center]
Last season the man from Buenos Aires found his playing time limited at the start thanks to the fine performances of Micah Richards but when he was called to action he put in such stellar performances that Micah was forced to watch the final games of last season from the bench.
This season he’s been aided by having started 11 of City’s 17 league games Zabba’s taken his performances to a new level. On Sunday at St James Park he was simply terrific. He was all over the place, covering, pressing the opposition and both his tackling and passing in the final third was excellent.
The word hero and legend is often bandied about too freely in the modern football era. Zabaleta seems to embody the spirit of the clubs support in one player; passionate, mad, committed, crazy, committed, loyal and a Champion all in one.
[center]The Royals
[/center]We’ve had few modern meetings with Reading and only 16 league encounters in our history.
Reading are another of the clubs that we played in our single season in England’s third tier that we’ve met since in the Premier League ( joining Fulham, Wigan, Stoke, Blackpool & Burnley). They came down with us finishing bottom, moving from Elm Park to the Madesjki Stadium the following year. They, like everyone else, saw City as they’re cup final causing the game to kick off 30 minutes late due to traffic. We beat them comfortably on the day on our way to promotion, having been held 0-0 at home, and they finished comfortably 11th in mid table whilst we went on our roller coaster up the leagues.
Several years since…
It seems a lifetime ago since we last played Reading in the Premier League. They came up in 06/07 and beat us on a Monday Night game in August after we threw the kitchen sink at them. In the return game they were hailed as the model run modern club as Leroy Lita and Steve Sidwell made us look like mugs. The following season it took a 94th minute Stephen Ireland winner to beat them after we again had thrown the kitchen sink at them. In the return game at the Madejski, on a day when most trains were cancelled and City fans were forced to cram onto trains with the women off to the Crufts dog show on the train, City put in quite simply their worst performance in modern history going down 2-0 without a fight in a game that in my opinion singled the end for Sven Goran Eriksson.
[center][youtube]1mGhAP5UmOY[/youtube]
I’d completely forgotten about the FA Cup QF. Other than the atmosphere and the novelty of a 4.45pm KO on a Sunday it was a bit of a blur.[/center]
So its Champions versus Champions this week thanks to the turn around in Readings’ fortune that saw them lose just 4 of their last 25 games, winning 20 of them and win the Football League Championship (its proper name).
The manager Brian McDermott is no Harry Redknapp when it comes to the media love in and just gets on with the job. He’s turned down bigger jobs to stay and finish the job at Reading and keeps such a low profile that when Reading reserves played a behind closed doors friendly in the week he couldn’t get in to watch.
It was an understated summer for the Royals as they chose to bank the TV millions and add only Bosman signings to the squad that won the league. Former Liverpool, Bolton and Newcastle midfield Danny Guthrie was the first to arrive, then the highly thought off Pavel Pogrebynak turned down the chance to remain at Fulham to coincidentally sign for a club with a Russian owner. Former promising left back and ‘England International’ Nicky Shorey returned to the club, Stuart Taylor (also won more league titles than Robin Van Persie) signed for Reading twice according to Wikipedia and Welsh international full back Chris Gunter was the only man they parted with a fee for (£2.3m from Forest).
I’ve seen very little of Reading this year other than the first half an hour against United. I thought Jason Roberts put on a masterclass of the tall striker against a weak goalkeeper and questionable centre half. The crowning moment being Patrice Evra complaining that he was blocking Lindegaard at a corner, only for the Danish keeper to try and grab hold of him, after the ref had stopped the game to have words, and be caught in no mans land as Le Fondre fired home a header.
Unfortunately after half an hour United realised it was only Jason Roberts and put Reading to the sword convincingly.
In goal they’ve deviated between Adam Federici and Alex McCarthy in goal. The basic make up of all Premier League goalkeepers is that you are a good shot stopper but Federici is the exception that proves the rule. He’s seemed to have gifted someone a goal in every fixture I’ve seen. Against United it was one of the most truly awful goalkeeping performances I’d ever seen.
I like to think I’m knowledgeable about football but other than Nicky Shorey I’ve genuinely never heard of the rest of the back line that is likely to play and feel less than qualified to comment.
The centre of midfield will consist of Jay Tabb, who forced Rafael to be substituted after half an hour, and ex-Palace and QPR man Mikele Leigterwood. On the left hand side of midfield they have youth graduate Hal Robson-Kanu and on the right it will most likely be London club collecter Jobi McAnuff. There is the potential for Guthrie or Brynjar Gunnarsson into the middle instead.
Up front Pavel Pogrebnyak has 5 goals from 14 games and will most likely start with ex-Rochdale and Stockport man Adam Le Fondre who arrived from Rotherham last season. Options include Jason Roberts as the classic big man we struggle against or 35 goals in 148 games Noel Hunt (no relation to Stephen Hunt).
[center]City
[/center]The injury list according to the Guardian:
Doubtful Kompany (groin)
Injured Nasri (groin, 29 Dec), Balotelli (illness, 29 Dec), Richards (knee, Jan), Rodwell (hamstring, Jan), Kolarov (groin, unknown)
If there is ever a game it’s not necessary to risk Kompany for it will be this one. There are plenty of fixtures over the Christmas period and Kolo Toure’s fine form over the last week should have instilled the confidence in Mancini that he can hopefully cope with Pogrebynak. The back 5 should pick itself but Reading like to play with a lot of width so we must BLOCK THOSES CROSSES!
In midfield it’s completely different from last week when the decision was whether we had to pick Sinclair or Garcia and hope for the best. Although Nasri looks like he’s out after taking one in the brains last week, again he’s not one worth risking, but it does mean that Milner should join Barry back in the team as he will also look to get whatever he can out of Yaya before the African Cup of Nations. Silva should be too much for Reading to handle and I can’t imagine him resting him.
Up front I’d start with Aguero and Tevez, they’re both playing themselves back into form at the moment and they’ve started to link well together and I’ve got them both in my fantasy team. If we play anything like we did last week we could break the Premier League record for most goals in a game Reading are that wide open at the back. I didn’t read anything about Mario’s tribunal in the week but I wouldn’t dream of starting him tomorrow (Premierleague.com says he will miss out with a virus) , there’s something wrong there and more than anything he needs to EARN his place in the team. Dzeko must start from the bench.
[center]Prediction:[/center]
Reading have lost their last 6 in a row and have even managed to replace QPR at the bottom of the table. Away from home they’ve drawn 2 and lost 7 of 9 fixtures, scored just 7 times but conceded just 17 (United have conceded 14) which means that Reading won’t be selling out their allocation tomorrow.
As always if we play to our best we’ll win but if we do this week we’ll break a scoring record or two. I really think we’re coming into form at the right time but we must take the game seriously and not feel the need to rest or rotate the squad.
2-1. Don't ask.