Man City were clinical with their chances early on and killed the game. Predictably we aren’t even close to that level, we’re absolutely miles away. We’d have needed them to have a seriously off day just to get a look in.
Some of our play was decent at times but you could see the lack of confidence hanging over the team, and like the rest of our games this year we were amazing at letting the opposition waltz through on the counter attack.
Despite all of that, is anyone else at the end of their tether with Man City’s tactical fouling? It’s absolutely disgusting. They just do it all day long, and no one even talks about this. Kolasinac was injured thanks to that, Pepe took a hammering all game, it’s just relentless, and the refs don’t seem to care what is going on. The yellows need to start earlier, and not stop, with that sort of behaviour. Despite them getting away with a lot of it this morning, they STILL managed 4 yellows before we got a single one, despite a 3 goal lead and superior possession. And then we got a first yellow with a tackle completely identical to many of theirs that had gone unpunished. I don’t recall a single transition from us that didn’t have a Man City foul in it somewhere. If they don’t stop the attack then at the very least they will take a player or two out of it. Pep can lie through his teeth all he wants but it’s 100% clear that they are trained to do this.