The Warm-Up: Manchester City's Deep Blue eclipse Jose Mourinho's chess pieces
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Updated 16/10/2017 at 07:06 GMT
Adam Hurrey appreciates Kevin De Bruyne's angles, Troy Deeney's honesty and some deliberately bad Bosnian defending...
David Silva of Manchester City celebrates scoring
Image credit: Getty Images
MONDAY’S BIG STORIES
Pack it all up, Manchester City are about to run away with the title
There’s something about a 7-2 scoreline that implies some mild chaos. Stoke might have briefly stumbled their way into contention at the Etihad – after having had less than 17% of the ball in the first half – but the rest of Manchester City’s latest showcase was a high-speed, high-quality procession.
There are apparently 2,000 varieties of peach, seven of which were shared among Pep Guardiola’s embarrassment of creative, penetrative riches on Saturday afternoon. Somewhere in between Kevin De Bruyne’s diamond-cut passing and Fernandinho pinging one in off the bar from 30 yards just to mix it up, there was a goal that had a slight whiff of a team playing with joyous, unimpeachable authority.
The basic projections are that City will rack up 138 goals this season. They will do well to score another one with quite the same geometric purity as their second against Stoke: 35 touches, 15 passes, 10 players (Gabriel Jesus just watching) and one simple finish for Raheem Sterling.
The fact that 1) Sergio Aguero was resting his cracked ribs on the sidelines and 2) City actually thought they needed Alexis Sanchez to complete their jigsaw this summer takes things into the realms of ridiculousness.
Mourinho and Klopp settle for security over spectacle
The growing weariness towards Premier League hype – or, more specifically, the hype for individual fixtures – was reflected in some of the build-up to Liverpool v Manchester United, a game that hasn’t consistently delivered for years. After a while, talk of how many millions are watching around the world and how little love is lost between these two starts to look a bit tired.
The latest instalment quickly set out its stall as no exception. Jose Mourinho’s gradual revival of a post-Van Gaal United hasn’t yet extended to a meaningful encounter with a title rival. While Manchester City steamroll the also-rans, they have also handed out a footballing lesson to the champions.
Mourinho was quick to counter accusations of negativity by placing the blame (if that’s the word) for the poor spectacle at the door of Jurgen Klopp. "I was waiting for Jurgen to change and go more attacking but he kept the three strong midfielders at all times,” Mourinho harrumphed afterwards. “So I know that probably you think we were defensive and they were offensive – well, you [Liverpool] are at home and you don’t move anything.”
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José Mourinho
Image credit: Getty Images
“For me, the second half was a bit of chess but my opponent didn’t open the door for me to win the game.”
Mourinho might be the Garry Kasparov of this chess analogy, but Manchester City’s Deep Blue are well-equipped to force checkmate this season.
Stretched, struggling Chelsea sunk by Roy the Revivalist
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Crystal Palace's Wilfried Zaha celebrates
Image credit: Reuters
Well-intended pre-match content it might have been, Chelsea’s “All you need to know about today’s opponents…” Twitter video felt like some serious fate-temptage, focusing mercilessly as it did on Crystal Palace’s grave record of seven goalless defeats.
At Selhurst Park on Saturday – deprived of the midfield urgency of the hamstrung N’Golo Kante – Chelsea were dreadful. As Roy Hodgson’s Palace flew out of the traps, the chances of ending at least one of their unenviable barren runs grew.
Wilfried Zaha scorched past the Chelsea rearguard – who look burnt out before November – time and time again, while the hosts soaked up the aimless probing of Eden Hazard, Willian and Michy Batshuayi at the other end.
This season’s workload – and the task of keeping up last season’s output – is already taking a toll on Antonio Conte’s squad. Roma and a buoyant Watford both visit Stamford Bridge in the next six days – Chelsea could be even more frazzled this time next week.
IN OTHER NEWS
Seasoned semi-viral football content enthusiasts will know that the best material comes from the second tiers of the world’s more overlooked leagues.
Over to the First League of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina then, where league leaders Zvijezda cruised to a 3-0 win over promotion hopefuls NK Bosna.
66.6% of that cruising, however, was thanks to all 10 visiting outfield players taking a knee in protest at the referee “provoking our people on the bench and laughing at them”. Zvijezda had little sympathy: they walked in two late goals to seal the three points.
Classic, classic Bosnian second-tier stuff.
HAT TIP
In training, where there is an emphasis on instilling patterns of movement in small, medium or large areas, the buzz phrase is practising the final ball or shot “under fatigue”. To Pochettino, the ability to repeat these decisive actions time and again, when tired, is all-important. He puts on drills that simulate the fatigue that a striker, for example, will feel at the end of a run and when he must gather himself to finish. This is where Kane excels.
The Guardian’sDavid Hytner gets closer than most authors of Harry Kane tributes have recently to explaining just how Tottenham’s main man goes about his tireless business.
IN THE CHANNELS
“Lads, it’s Arsenal.”
Watford’s unapologetically unpolished Troy Deeney stopped short of elevating Arsenal’s eminent beatability to Roy-Keane-on-Tottenham levels.
But – in the sort of relaxed, revealing studio chat that we really ought to be allowed to see more often – he calmly put “Mr Wenger” and co to the sword.
Further proof – if it were at all needed – that Arsenal remain the most satisfying scalp for a certain kind of no-nonsense, grafting footballer.
RETRO CORNER
On this day in 1996: Old foes Brazil and Lithuania went head-to-head for…well, the one and only time, actually.
Quite what Lithuania’s finest were doing in the remote, humid northern city of Teresina for a friendly with the World Cup holders isn’t entirely clear.
Anyway, Orestas Buitkus scored an absolute beauty into the top corner to give them something to write home about…only for a 20-year-old Ronaldo to notch a hat-trick at the other end.
COMING UP
Last, but not least, for the Premier League weekend: Leicester will carve out a narrow, sweaty victory over West Brom at the King Power, probably thanks to a Jamie Vardy penalty.
Tomorrow’s edition will be brought to you by Nick Miller, who may just about have Derby 2-0 Nottingham Forest out of his system by then. Maybe.
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