Pep Guardiola is renowned for constantly changing his side’s approach, particularly when things are going well.
The Manchester City manager is terrified of resting on his laurels and finding that opponents have ‘worked out’ his system, and therefore evolves as much after title successes as he does after his rare failures. Having won four straight league titles for the first time, then, perhaps we should expect an even greater evolution than usual for 2024-25.
His starting XI for the 2-0 victory against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge in City’s 2024-25 Premier League opener was familiar from last season, with the exception of new signing Savinho.
The use of both the Brazilian and Jeremy Doku provided City with two ‘proper’ wingers, almost pure dribblers — a way of playing Guardiola has used relatively rarely in recent seasons. In a way, it harked back to his first title-winning City side in 2017-18, when Raheem Sterling and Leroy Sane were the men out wide.
Sterling and Sane were always deployed on their ‘natural’ sides — the right-footed Sterling down the right, left-footed Sane on the left. And on Sunday, with Doku starting on the right and Savinho on the left, it was the same type of approach.
That said, after Doku shanked an early cross behind and sliced a shot having cut inside, it was clear things weren’t going too well. City’s wingers switched sides after 15 minutes; that was their decision, said Guardiola, rather than his.
After that point, Guardiola was not merely playing with inverted wingers, but, in a sense, inverted No 8s too. His standard approach at City has been to use Kevin De Bruyne in the inside-right channel, and Bernardo Silva, when joining him in that position, from the left. But instead, De Bruyne played to the left against Chelsea and Bernardo to the right throughout the game.
At times, De Bruyne actually took up even wider positions, way out on the left, hugging the touchline, perhaps attempting to exploit Cole Palmer’s lack of defensive awareness.
That means his touch map looked like this — note he had no contact with the ball whatsoever in what could be considered his trademark inside-right channel.
And, while that felt like something of a surprise, it’s interesting to go back to last season and assess the positions of De Bruyne’s touches during it. The busiest zone isn’t through the centre or on the right, but in that outside-left area he was in yesterday.
De Bruyne’s positioning, then, shouldn’t have been a complete surprise. But deploying the two No 8s in that manner does make things awkward for him and Bernardo at times.
In this situation, when Doku — having switched to the left — slips in De Bruyne in the channel, he can’t get around the ball enough to deliver this cross to Erling Haaland.
Granted, he was being closed down by two opponents. But from the right, he’s a natural at this type of delivery.
Similarly, when Savinho played this classic City ball, into the channel for their inside-right…
…Bernardo cuts inside…
…and is dispossessed, whereas the right-footed De Bruyne would surely have fizzed a delivery across the six-yard box.
But in a different way, City’s plan worked. That was due to the positioning of Rico Lewis, City’s specialist half-back who played as a right-back without possession and as a right-sided midfielder when they had the ball.
This is a good example of Lewis suddenly springing forward into space, receiving a pass between the lines…
…and playing it on to Doku.
At times, Lewis effectively became part of a front six.
His runs allowed Bernardo to play as more of a No 10 — and, increasingly, as another inside-left. Here, with De Bruyne again out on the left, Savinho slips in Bernardo for a first-time shot, which is blocked.
On other occasions, Bernardo and De Bruyne effectively worked in the same area.
Here, Lewis’ positioning has again allowed Bernardo to wander across to the left channel. He actually finds himself as a centre-forward, perfectly between the two centre-backs. He does well to deflect Doku’s driven pass on to Haaland, who muscles his way through to open the scoring.
Haaland’s other major chance of the game was similar.
Again, Lewis is inside from the right. Again, Bernardo has moved across to join De Bruyne in the left channel. Again, it starts from Doku. This time, he feeds De Bruyne…
…whose forward pass is intended for Bernardo, albeit it reaches him via a deflection.
Again, Bernardo prods the ball inside to Haaland, but this time his shot is saved.
In the grand scheme of things, this wasn’t an overly elaborate Guardiola system, although a 4-3-3 that so fluently becomes something like a 3-3-1-3 in possession remains impressive.
But it was a reminder that City’s system on paper is very rarely the system that appears out on the pitch.
(Photo: Adrian Dennis/AFP via Getty Images)
Read the full article here