For the past decade Manchester City have been defined, on the pitch, by one man. Pep Guardiola. He’s the man who has been credited with revolutionizing football, responsible for bringing positional play, or juego de posicion to English shores.
Since the start of 2016 you knew exactly what you were going to get from Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City. Positional football with patient buildup, meticulous passing, and a suffocating counter press. This wasn’t attacking football. It wasn’t done for the sake
of blitzing their opponent and trying to score six goals in every game. Quite the opposite. This was defense first. City were determined to maintain as much possession of the ball so their opponent couldn’t have it.
They progressed the ball up the pitch slowly and meticulously. The entire team moving as a unit. The purpose wasn’t to catch a defense out of position and create a scoring chance, they moved slowly so that if they ever lost the ball, they were always in position to win it back.
Guardiola’s City were built to smother opponents. This is why they weren’t particularly great at playing from behind. In Pep’s 10 years in charge City faced (only) 103 deficits, a staggeringly low amount far better than any of their rivals. But they were no better at regaining points from losing positions than those rivals. Their average position in the “points gained from losing positions” table was 11.2 (albeit impacted by not having many opportunities). They were built to get a lead then suffocate their opponents to kill off the game.
City were so good at this that over time this become the perceived “right” way to play football. Having the ball was considered “front foot,” playing without the ball was considered negative. Dropping deep into a low block? That was the lowest form of the game. It was almost considered disgraceful, and would certainly never happen on Guardiola’s watch.
Pep Guardiola stepped away from Manchester City last summer. He was replaced by Enzo Maresca who had previously spent time managing City’s Elite Development Squad and serving as an assistant under Guardiola. The succession plan was clear. City weren’t looking for something radically different from their new manager. They appointed Maresca to try and have the most tactical continuity possible.
The plan was to go from Guardiola to a different version of Guardiola. Guadiola light if you will. Then Sunday’s Manchester Derby came along and, Manchester City did not look anything close to a Guardiola team.
For the first quarter of the match (that’s 23 minutes for those who forgot about the World Cup’s “hydration breaks”) United were the ones smothering City. United were playing through City and the blues were struggling to get the ball out of their own half. The game changed when Phil Foden was sent off in the 23rd minute but the sequence leading to the red card comes from City being unable to deal with United’s press.
City actually seemed to gain a foothold in the match immediately following the red card, which is what you would expect them to do. During the Pep Guardiola era City received a first half red card eight times. Every time they went down a man they just kept playing their game.
In seven of the eight games City scored a goal after going down to 10 men. The only time they failed was in a match where they were already trailing Patrick Vierra’s Crystal Palace. Only twice in those eight games did City finish with less than 50 percent possession – once against Nuno Santos’ Wolves and once in an end of the season dead rubber against Brighton. Those were the three matches they lost. They drew once against Everton (also falling behind before going down a man) and won the other four matches. In those wins they averaged 63.75 percent possession. Going down a man didn’t phase them, they just played their possession game with one less man.
That’s what City largely did on Sunday. They didn’t press United but tried to get forward when they had the ball. When they lost it, they fell back into a 4-3-2/4-4-1 shape.
This continued into the second half, with City defending as you would expect from a team with 10 men. Here they fall into a 4-1-3-1 shape as United get the ball near the box.
There are spaces between the lines. There are gaps to exploit – which United could have done if they weren’t undone by some poor touches.
Nevertheless, those spaces were there.
Just before the hour mark City were given a farcial goal, which we won’t go into here (a full tactical breakdown of both the goal and the farce is available here). The goal, which never should have been given, changed the entire match not simply because of the score, but because of how City reacted to it.
Under Guardiola, City probably wouldn’t have changed much. After all, the best way to defend a lead is to make sure your opponent doesn’t have the ball. If they don’t have the ball they can’t score. That’s the enlightened way of playing.
If the plan for City was for Maresca to try and keep the Guardiola era going he made sure to tell you that there’s a new sheriff in town. As soon as City went 1-0 up, Maresca got his team in that bus and parked it right in front of City’s box. They immediately started dropping six men across the back line, holding the line right at the top of the box.
No more expansive play. City would (cautiously) push up to try and find a second goal, but when they lost the ball they just backed right up, allowing United to walk the ball up the pitch.
This eliminated United’s ability to play through the lines as you can’t play through the lines if there are no lines to play through! Everyone stayed behind the ball, backing up as United advanced.
United would walk the ball all the way up to the final third where they were then hit with a wretched low block. City would defend with as many as seven men lined up across the top of the box.
Even if United pulled the ball back out, City were not stepping out. They were holding that block and staying deep.
The way City set up their block wasn’t just to defend the middle. There was a method to this. They set out to take away the number one thing United wanted to do. By taking away United’s plan A, you force them to scamper around for new, and often less good, ideas.
United want to attack through the middle of the pitch – that’s where their best players are. City dropped five players across the back line but played them very narrow. Just in front of the defense, they parked two midfielders, creating a box right at the top of the box.
If United had tried to go through the middle of the pitch, or attack through the half-spaces, City could close them down immediately. United want to attack through the middle but all they were finding were traffic jams.
City stayed very narrow leaving the only space for United to find out wide. That meant trying to find their way through the block via Diogo Dalot or Patrick Dorgu. If you’re relying on those two players to break down a block, you’re in trouble. Neither of them are particularly creative players or passers, which made City all the more happy to funnel the ball to them.
City parked the bus in the middle of the pitch. Their goal is take away any combination play that can get the ball into the box and lead to a dangerous shot. They’ll concede space out wide because that’s where they want you to have the ball. They want you to start going down the outside and start pumping in cross to the 6’5 striker Benjamin Sesko.
Doing that is playing right into City’s hands. They want you to cross that ball as Sesko is not only being tightly marked by a good aerial defender, but City have so much numerical superiority in the box, it’s unlikely that cross is even going to reach Sesko.
Low blocks love it when teams resort to pampering the box with crosses. It’s exactly what they want you to do because it’s so easy to defend against.
City executed the low block perfectly. As you would expect from a team with the most talented players in the league. Many of those players, such as Elliott Anderson, Marc Guehi, and Iliman Ndiaye have plenty of experience playing low blocks with their former clubs.
Manchester City playing a low block. The Pep Guardiola era is truly in the past.
