Premier League Hangover: Guardiola Has No Case for Defence

There are no official statistics available on what percentage of T-shirts sold are adorned with half-baked cod philosophies or quotations, but one suspects it would be high enough to ensure every Manchester-based bootlegger worth their salt will have put into production a batch emblazoned with "What are tackles?"

If Manchester City's commercial department had any acumen, they would have copyrighted Pep Guardiola's response to being told his players had failed to win a single one of them in the opening 35 minutes of Saturday's abject 4-2 defeat to Leicester City and made their own for the Christmas market. T-shirts that is, not tackles.

Sell enough in the official club superstore to hipsters and they might just be able to afford a centre-half capable of answering the question. After all, they're probably still shifting "Why always me?" baby grows.

In these austere times, it might have been presumed a £174 million summer outlay would have been enough to include regeneration of a back line grown old and bloated under his predecessors. Evidently not. Guardiola's City have now conceded two more goals than his Bayern Munich side did in the entirety of last season's Bundesliga campaign.

Like Jose Mourinho at Manchester United, it seems to have been generally accepted Guardiola will need a couple more transfer windows to get it right. Life's tough at the top, but it seems the big boys get nearly as many transfer windows to prove themselves as those at the bottom do matches.

Guardiola's impromptu polemic on the topic of tackling made for interesting reading, per the Telegraph’s Sam Wallace: "The second ball is a concept, it's typical here in England when they use a lot of tackles. I am not a coach for the tackles. I don't train for tackles. What I want is to try to play well and score goals. What are tackles?"

Guardiola is an erudite and intelligent man. Even in the aftermath of a bludgeoning, he would surely have been aware it was the type of comment to have his acolytes purring and adversaries profaning.

BT Sports' resident wind-up mouth Robbie Savage was apoplectic in the studio. Medics were put on standby such was the fear of a live spontaneous combustion. Alas, Guardiola was denied an assist for the one thing that would have united in his favour a split football community—a well-timed commercial break provided the audience respite from Savage, and Savage respite from his own ire. 

"If Jose Mourinho was manager of this Man City side, he would be getting absolutely hammered for that display," Savage ranted at half-time, presumably in the hope someone with more gravitas would join in.

Sat beside him, Richard Dunne looked non-committal, as though trapped on a train after a work Christmas party with a guy from accounts he doesn't know very well, who has decided to loudly unburden his marital problems to a packed carriage.

The problem with Savage, indeed with any outspoken public critic, is he elects himself spokesman for parties that don't want him to speak on their behalf. It's now impossible to criticise Claudio Bravo without it being implied it's because you house a shrine to Joe Hart in your cellar.

To question any aspect of Guardiola's makeup as a manager is to invite a withered look usually reserved for suspected "out" voters at dinner parties. Even in Stasi-controlled East Berlin, it would have been safe to say skinny jeans and Converse combinations don't float your boat without fear of reprisals.

If last weekend ended in high farce for Manchester City against Chelsea, this weekend started with it. Within four minutes at the King Power Stadium, they were two goals down, by the 20-minute mark, it was three.

"After four minutes, at 2-0 down, the mind of the players is 'What is going on? What happened?'" said Guardiola post-match, per Wallace.

No player seemed to be wondering what was going on in those first 20 minutes quite like Pablo Zabaleta. Manchester City were in a war, and their most natural leader, and captain for the day in the continued absence of Vincent Kompany, more resembled a character out of Dad's Army than Platoon.

It was as though he had sleepwalked out of a trench on to the battlefield. If Zabaleta had looked any more disorientated in a central-midfield role (in the loosest possible sense), referee Michael Oliver would have been duty-bound to call social services.

The phone lines may have been busy, though, given scores of viewers will have been moved to implore an investigation into whether the tramlines Oliver sported in his hair were a cry for help. 

"

Leicester smash Man City 4-2, and still the highlight of the match was Michael Oliver rocking the most horrendous tramlines  pic.twitter.com/jT7KxGQyxZ

— Copa90 (@Copa90) December 10, 2016"

Manchester City started the game with a 3-2-4-1 formation, high line and seeming determination to make the pitch as big and game as stretched as possible. Who could ever have imagined they might have been playing into the hands of a Leicester side that pulled off arguably the greatest heist in sporting history last season by playing a counter-attacking game? City were set up as though no one in their coaching team had ever seen Leicester play.

The only possible explanation for such an acute tactical misjudgment would be if Guardiola is found this week bound and gagged in the basement of the King Power, with Leicester boss Claudio Ranieri having delivered the away side's team talk by virtue of donning a Scooby-Doo-style Guardiola mask.

Debate over whether Guardiola is a genius or charlatan will rumble on all season, but what cannot be disputed is that Manchester City were truly, deeply, maddeningly atrocious at the weekend. Guardiola will be delighted with 78 per cent possession, but it's like with sausages: The bit to worry about is what's going on with the remaining 22 per cent. 

Over the course of 90 minutes, Manchester City racked up 731 passes. In taking a 4-0 lead, Leicester needed less than 10 in the buildup for all of their goals combined. Ultimately, the only numbers that matter are the ones on the scoreboard at full-time.

Ranieri's side had started the day a point outside of the relegation zone, on the back of a week in which they had lost to Sunderland in the league and were then humiliated 5-0 in a miserable midweek European sojourn to Porto. The champions have seemingly been worked out by the rest of the Premier League, having won just two of their last 10 league games—and only three in total all season.

The only side in English football history to have been relegated in the season immediately after winning a top-flight title is Manchester City in 1938. The current incarnation played as though it was a record they were determined to keep hold of.

No two players have exemplified Leicester's struggles more than Jamie Vardy and Riyad Mahrez. Both were sensational on the day, and both owe Guardiola a debt of gratitude.

Rather than double up on Mahrez as many sides have done effectively this season, City played with just Kevin De Bruyne down the same side as the Algerian. The Belgian is no more a defender than the Leicester man.

When Robert Huth's booming header of a clearance found Mahrez in space it was no surprise, nor was his instant control and cute pass into the feet of Islam Slimani. Vardy's strike partner in a simple 4-4-2 threaded through a nicely weighted pass in between John Stones and Aleksandar Kolarov, which seemed to have the effect of a tranquilizer dart as the pair were rendered semi-comatose thereafter.

From here, and for the rest of the game, it was all about Vardy.

Forget David Attenborough's baby iguana escaping from an army of snakes on Planet Earth II, here was a cheetah being released from captivity into the glorious wide plains in behind City's back three. Bravo did just as he did against Chelsea for Willian's goal in making himself as small as possible and the target to aim for the exact opposite. Vardy clipped into the far post for his first club goal in 15 games, to end a 741-minute drought in the league.

City have now kept just two clean sheets in their last 10 Premier League matches. They have won four of their last 15 games. 

Then came the totally-out-of-the-blue aerial bombardment from Leicester, as the away side attacked balls thrown into their box as one might a snowball dipped in dog dirt. Huth had no such fears. It was from the German's flick off a long throw-in that Slimani again demonstrated he has a decent touch and feet in laying the ball back to Andy King. The Welshman shifted the ball a yard and bent it into the near-top corner of Bravo's goal.

Leicester have been compared to a covers band this season, but it's more they have already made an album they will never top—and know it. The key for them is to never forget they have hits in the locker and never be embarrassed to play them on a loop.

At 2-0, Guardiola switched to a back four, but it was just as porous. Leicester retreated, of their own accord, happy to pick off misplaced passes, numerous as they were, and then break on their visitors in a 2015/2016 style that somehow almost seems vintage, despite it being no more than six months or so ago since they were doing it every week. 

Christian Fuch's long, diagonal cross-field pass after City's forwards had forgotten to press in the 20th minute drew one of the moments of the season, as Mahrez set up Vardy for the first time since their 2-0 win over Liverpool back in February 2016.

His first-time cushioned pass to Vardy was like something Roger Federer might drop off his racket at the net to leave an opponent at first irritated by his insouciance, fading into awe when it dawns it is sometimes enough to be in the presence of a little genius—even if it's at your expense.

Vardy sat Bravo down before rolling the ball into the net, not first without having made Kolarov look like a farm vehicle chasing a Ferrari.

On Match of the Day, pundit Danny Murphy pointed out Kolarov's average position in the first half was higher up the pitch than Kelechi Iheanacho, who had come in for the suspended Sergio Aguero as City's lone striker. Kolarov's fine free-kick and assist for substitute Nolito as City rallied late on to reduce the deficit and temper a scoreline that had gone to 4-0, courtesy of Vardy’s hat-trick goal, should not disguise the fact the Serb was again nothing less than appalling defensively.

Either he completely disregarded where his manager told him to play, or Guardiola told him to play in a position that was always going to be exposed by an on-song Mahrez.

City's other full-back playing as a centre-half, Bacary Sagna, was little better than either of his partners. When Stones is the natural defender in a three, it's time to panic. He never does, maybe that's the problem.

It seems an unspoken law has emerged this season that the right and proper thing to do is precursor every assessment of a Stones defensive howler with either, "he's an easy target but..." or "we've got to encourage English defenders to play out from the back but..."—as though the Queen has shot one of her corgis for defecating on a Royal rug and no one knows quite how critical it's permissible to be without being thrown in the Tower.

The player himself seems down to earth, amiable, willing to learn and not shy with his confidence. Quite why so many feel he'd crumble at the impertinence of being judged in exactly the same way as every other defender in the Premier League is somewhat mystifying. To his credit, Jamie Carragher was happy to break ranks. 

Stones' latest howler saw him play in Vardy with a specialty loose back pass. The Leicester man rounded Bravo again to steer in from an impossible angle, which proved to be no such thing, as the striker completed his first hat-trick since the one he scored for Fleetwood Town against Ebbsfleet in the Blue Square Bet Premier League back in 2012.

The notion Stones is unquestionably good at playing out from the back seems to be undermined just a smidgeon by the fact he keeps giving goals away by playing out from the back. If every 10th decent pass is followed by a kamikaze one, it's still nowhere near a good enough ratio. It's a bit like a restaurant asking customers not to leave a bad TripAdvisor review because only one person at the table got food poisoning.

Guardiola may get harder as the season goes on and his patience wears thinner. Not everyone gets the carrot, as Hart, Samir Nasri and Yaya Toure will attest having felt the sharp end of the stick, but for the moment it seems he can forgive anything except his philosophy being betrayed.

All of which can seem a little egomaniacal given at times on Saturday City's defenders repeatedly played themselves into trouble when attempting passes that were either not on or simply beyond them. Perversely, in repeatedly telling his players to be free and not be worried about making mistakes, it can look as though he has imprisoned them in a utopian footballing vision of his own design.

It's all very well the fact he'd probably have been angrier at Stones for knocking the ball out of play than errantly back to Bravo for Vardy's third goal, but most Manchester City supporters wouldn't.

And for that, there's no defence.

     
All statistics provided by WhoScored.com unless otherwise stated