Alan Shearer: Pep Guardiola’s indecision is giving struggling Manchester City back problems
Formations and personnel change regularly and the players who get the nod look uncertain about their role
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PEP GUARDIOLA is cutting a very angry, frustrated and agitated figure.
When the media becomes the target of your ire off the pitch, you know things aren’t working well on it.
The way his Manchester City team managed to fashion a draw from such a position of dominance against Tottenham on Saturday evening will understandably not have helped his demeanour.
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Yes, it was a penalty late on when Raheem Sterling was pushed — but that incident helped to mask the fact his side blew a 2-0 lead.
The problems with the goalkeeper are well documented but he was not to blame for either goal.
City simply cannot defend and a lot of the indecision at the back comes from the indecision of the manager.
He changes from three at the back to four or five.
The personnel change regularly too and the ones that do play look uncertain about their role.
They are asked to do one thing by Guardiola but their own instincts seem to suggest they do another.
City are fifth, just two points ahead of Manchester United.
Their last nine league games have brought four wins, four defeats and a draw.
Yes, he has only been with the club since the summer but this was still not how it was meant to be.
Time is a short commodity in football, even shorter it seems at Manchester City when you have owners who have spent like they have spent.
The money, however, has not always been spent wisely — the last couple of years in particular.
They are going to have to spend more because Guardiola clearly does not have the players to do what he wants.
Having said that to finish outside the top four this season will be unthinkable for club and manager.
This is a real perfectionist who appears to put a lot of pressure on himself and it can tell at times.
The aura that he has created around himself on the back of his success at Barcelona and Bayern Munich has served to increase the expectation around him at City.
He has looked uneasy with his own billing.
When he was appointed at City it seemed to be a given that domestic league and Champions League success would follow.
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He was at pains to explain that it would not be that easy and it hasn’t been.
He has landed in the Premier League when the competition has never been greater.
We might not have all the best players but we certainly have the best managers right now with the top six all being led by the top names in the game.
There is no longer a two-horse race in this league and that is making it tougher for everyone.
To think Guardiola’s genius would leave the rest in City’s wake was to underestimate the managerial talent elsewhere.
Nobody was going to let this man have his own way.
Perhaps he is a victim of romanticism over pragmatism right now.
Of sticking to a game plan that makes for beautiful viewing at its best but calamitous indecision at its worst.
Of believing you have to score a goal a certain way when something simpler can be chosen.
In that sense we should in a way admire him.
He says he is not wanting to change English football — but in essence he is.
Again for that we should perhaps be thankful as he tries to bring a new dimension to our game.
Look at how many sides now seem intent on playing the ball out from the back as if it is somehow football from the dark ages should a goalkeeper kick it long.
Yet the long and more direct game is exactly what Mourinho employed the previous weekend to bypass Liverpool’s high pressing and get something from the match.
You sense that Pep would never do that, never bend from his set of principles on how things should be done.
Yet, when the money that has been invested at a club is so great and the bar has been set so high, it is all about results in the end — and at City they need to improve.