TFC's Tactical Autopsy Thread

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FightingIllini said:
That's true, but when we play the likes of Liverpool or City (or even Leicester or Watford), our overall lack of pace shows.

What City does lack, true of many of Pep's teams, is physicality.
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I really don't think it's an issue for them. It's not like teams ever out muscle or physically intimidate them. We didn't.

They just play round you, pull teams around, and use intelligence - footballing and tactical - to outsmart you.
 
bus-conductor said:
I said this in the match thread, and since, but Poch's tactics were about as counter intuitive as they could be. You knew what City would do, 433, overload wide areas, and if you allow your FB's to get isolated they can go inside and outside, especially if you are playing a high line. Poch basically unticked all the boxes. Narrow diamond, no cohesive pressing just spasmodic efforts, no wide cover, highish line but two strikers and the diamond meaning we were stretched out vertically. As a result City could just walk through us and constantly create those wide overloads.
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Poch's tactics were incredibly risky, but it is possible that he decided to focus on exploiting their weaknesses. That is how I am coming to see it. From a defensive point of view, our tactics were very worrying but they had some value in the attacking sense.
bus-conductor said:
I know you think Skipp's not ready, but he was the only midfielder on our bench, he's a busy little fucker who's tenacious, and singling him out against Leicester is unfair, Sissoko was no better that day.
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For once in your life, could you leave Sissoko out of it? Skipp was hopeless against Leicester. When he came on against Huddersfield, he was anonymous, but he's just out of nappies, I get it.
bus-conductor said:
And none of our midfielders were great on Wednesday, could Skipp really have been more of a tactically catastrophe than Llorente?
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It's hard to say. Llorente was awful but scored a goal. Would Skipps have been overawed? I think he would.

bus-conductor said:
Would have meant we could go 451, get Skipp and Alli
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Is that the same Alli you spent all evening demanding that he be subbed off? All of his deficiencies as a central midfielder gloriously exposed.
bus-conductor said:
And another thing I just do not understand is why, regardless of how we started, we weren't instructed and prepared for what to do if we got a lead in this game. At that point surely we should have learnt from previous years (like Juve last year) and been drilled to change up and become more pragmatic in shape and application - move immediately to a more defensive structure and mind set.
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Perhaps because once we were 3-1 ahead in the tie, we knew that City would have to throw the kitchen sink at us, and leave more gaps for us to exploit as a result? There wasn't time to draw breath before the first 4 goals flew in. Who would have thought that we should immediately change our formation?
 
bus-conductor said:
And this in a nutshell is why I have such a major issue with Poch continually picking Sissoko, and why I'd happily see someone like Skipp. It's not even as if Sissoko is clever or busy defensively.

Poch wants to play like Pep, but picks players like Dier and Sissoko in midfield, it's totally counter intuitive.
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Poch and Pep are similar but I don't think their philosophy is the same.

bus-conductor said:
And this in a nutshell is why I have such a major issue with Poch continually picking Sissoko, and why I'd happily see someone like Skipp. It's not even as if Sissoko is clever or busy defensively.
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What you want is novelty. We know exactly what we will get with Sissoko. With Skipp, we can only speculate.
 
Five said:
Poch's tactics were incredibly risky, but it is possible that he decided to focus on exploiting their weaknesses. That is how I am coming to see it. From a defensive point of view, our tactics were very worrying but they had some value in the attacking sense.

For once in your life, could you leave Sissoko out of it? Skipp was hopeless against Leicester. When he came on against Huddersfield, he was anonymous, but he's just out of nappies, I get it.

It's hard to say. Llorente was awful but scored a goal. Would Skipps have been overawed? I think he would.


Is that the same Alli you spent all evening demanding that he be subbed off? All of his deficiencies as a central midfielder gloriously exposed.

Perhaps because once we were 3-1 ahead in the tie, we knew that City would have to throw the kitchen sink at us, and leave more gaps for us to exploit as a result? There wasn't time to draw breath before the first 4 goals flew in. Who would have thought that we should immediately change our formation?
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But surely he could have still tried to exploit City's vulnerabilities without creating a shitload of his own. Just play an orthodox 433 for fuck sake, or a 4231 but make sure you tactically manage the areas you City want to exploit.Make sure you have players dropping in and covering wide areas. You can't just leave your FB's isolated etc.

I just think it's fucking naive in the extreme to think your going to "out-exploit" or "out-gamble" Guardiola's City at their place. You don't control enough of the game (without the ball) to do that. We can't keep making excuses for Poch's "positivity" at some point we have to say continually trying to play the same way against someone like Huddersfield as you do against City is just not clever ( not that we did play the 4121 diamond against Hudd but you get my point).

Did you think Alli was good? My point was that regardless of the reality or what I thought of any given player, Poch could have done something tactically different that might have been more effective.

I know I am labouring the Sissoko point, but I think it is fundamental to everything we do with and without the ball, the midfield steers the game with and without the ball. This is not just about Sissoko, as you know, I think this is a weakness Poch has in general, and has been going on a while, he wants us to play a certain way, but he does not seem to marry the players he needs to achieve the football he seems to want us to play with that philosophy.
 
Are we not over analysing here ?

We played against one of the best teams in Europe and came out on top after 180 minutes. They could probably put out 2 teams that would beat us on paper. Fortunately the game is not played on paper.

Our injury ravaged small squad left Poch with a very limited number of options. The Llorente substitution being a case in point.

What Pochettino has instilled in this group is fighting spirit. It was bravery, skill and a little luck that got us through , not any sophisticated tactical wizardry . Let’s enjoy the moment.
 
Five said:
This is a quote from Pep after the first leg:

"Bernardo is injured and Kevin de Bruyne could play, but I decided on David Silva and Ilkay Gundogan in that position," Guardiola told BT Sport. "Tottenham's physicality is incredible so we will use him when we need."

Pep Guardiola explains Man City team selection vs Tottenham Hotspur
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But when have we successfully outmuscled them or win because we physically intimidated them? When has anyone?

The only way you stop them is by being tactically switched on.
 
Five said:
Poch and Pep are similar but I don't think their philosophy is the same.


What you want is novelty. We know exactly what we will get with Sissoko. With Skipp, we can only speculate.
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I don’t think it’s their philosophies that are wildly different, I think it’s their abilities to apply them.

Poch is a great coach, Guardiola outstanding and the best of his generation .

It’s really not a novelty I want.
 
bus-conductor said:
This is not just about Sissoko, as you know, I think this is a weakness Poch has in general, and has been going on a while, he wants us to play a certain way, but he does not seem to marry the players he needs to achieve the football he seems to want us to play with that philosophy.
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You know I agree with you on this. But because of our inertia in the transfer market, it is becoming more difficult to know what his philosophy is these days. We are trying to make do with very limited options.
bus-conductor said:
Did you think Alli was good?
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I thought he was very poor. He showed next to no awareness of the basic responsibilities of a midfielder. He is so one-paced when we are without the ball, it is painful. When Eriksen was being pressed by 3 City players and subsequently dispossessed in the build-up to the disallowed goal, did you see what Alli was doing? He was bombing forward on his own.
 
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bus-conductor said:
It’s really not a novelty I want.
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It fucking is. You've spent about 7-10 years watching Sissoko play for teams you follow, and you know exactly what you are going to get from him.
bus-conductor said:
I don’t think it’s their philosophies that are wildly different, I think it’s their abilities to apply them.
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Poch prefers a less risky approach to the game, generally speaking. Pep is wonderful in many ways, and City play the best football in the country. But he has never had to work with a limited budget and his CL record is garbage.
 
bus-conductor said:
But surely he could have still tried to exploit City's vulnerabilities without creating a shitload of his own. Just play an orthodox 433 for fuck sake, or a 4231 but make sure you tactically manage the areas you City want to exploit.Make sure you have players dropping in and covering wide areas. You can't just leave your FB's isolated etc.
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Well how the fuck did City concede 2 goals inside the first 7 minutes? At home? I'd love to hear your thoughts on where Man City went wrong. It looks as though we decided to concede the flanks to them, and kill them on the counter-press/transition. In theory, we should have had the overload in the central area of the pitch, 4 v 3. They left gaps, we left gaps. All of their goals could have been defended better.
 
Five said:
You know I agree with you on this. But because of our inertia in the transfer market, it is becoming more difficult to know what his philosophy is these days. We are trying to make do with very limited options.

I thought he was very poor. He showed next to no awareness of the basic responsibilities of a midfielder. He is so one-paced when we are without the ball, it is painful. When Eriksen was being pressed by 3 City players and subsequently dispossessed in the build-up to the disallowed goal, did you see what Alli was doing? He was bombing forward on his own.
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So you understand why I was calling for him to be subbed?

But that doesn't mean before we start, or while he's on, I wouldn't want Poch to make better tactical use of him.
 
Five said:
It fucking is. You've spent about 7-10 years watching Sissoko play for teams you follow, and you know exactly what you are going to get from him.

Poch prefers a less risky approach to the game, generally speaking. Pep is wonderful in many ways, and City play the best football in the country. But he has never had to work with a limited budget and his CL record is garbage.
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I just think Poch (or any Guadiola's peers , including Klopp for example) need to build less risk into their personnel because they can't coach the same risk aversion through total control of the ball that Guardiola does.
 
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