Manchester City Fan View: Inquest begins into Champions League exit

After all of the hype building up to the second leg of Manchester City’s visit to AS Monaco in the Champions League, the Blues produced a dreadfully disappointing display as they bowed out of the tournament. It represents the first time manager Pep Guardiola has exited at the Round of 16, having never previously failed to reach to semi-final.

The inquest will doubtless rage on for days as 24-hour rolling news channels and sports radio stations fill their air time with different analysts repeating the same points. The arguments made and laboriously stretched out essentially boil down to a key question; Does the blame lie at the door of Pep Guardiola for his tactics, or do the players have to take the heat for their performance? As is invariably the case, there’s more than a grain of truth in both ideas.

Guardiola’s Tactics

Did Pep get it wrong? In overly-simplistic terms, his approach was to attack Monaco. Despite holding a two-goal advantage from the first leg, he knew that Monaco’s attacking prowess coupled with the three away goals they had in hand made them a formidable opponent. Anticipating that they would score again, he knew City couldn’t just shut up shop and try and close the game out. At any rate, even if the tie had called for that, it’s hardly a style Guardiola is renowned for.

The decision to try and go on the offensive is one that Guardiola will doubtless feel comfortable with today, as he pours over what went wrong and analyses the match. It was right – to attack was the correct decision. In hindsight, he might have better partnering Yaya Touré with Fernandinho in midfield for support; the Brazilian was overrun completely. With Kevin De Bruyne woefully out of form right now, it perhaps would have been wise to take him off duty and let Yaya’s quality and experience come into play. His intelligence and composure was a significant loss, especially in the first half where Monaco completely overwhelmed their guests. Putting Touré in would hardly have sacrificed attacking talent, but would have surely made the team more stable.

You could argue that the more significant mistake on Guardiola’s part was to be so public with his approach to the game. In the immediate aftermath of the thrilling first leg, in which his side twice came from a goal down and saved a penalty on the way to a 5-3 victory, he was clear in his belief that City would have to score in Monaco. He openly stated that his side would have to attack because Monaco would find the net themselves. When Leonardo Jardim’s side should have been on the floor after giving everything and coming up short at the Etihad Stadium, the last thing they should have received was a boost from the opposition manager. Anybody who knows anything about the two sides could have reasonably predicted that City would not play to defend the lead and that Monaco, with their astonishing scoring record, would notch a goal or two. They just didn’t need to hear it from City’s boss for three weeks leading up to the fixture.

The players

The majority of the blame for City’s exit must fall on the players. Time and time again, they made bad decisions or failed to act. Goals were conceded due to failing to close down crosses into the box or ball watching. Attacking players were indecisive; Raheem Sterling was guilty of not making up his mind in the box and allowed a chance to die before trying to hand responsibility over to Sergio Agüero, but his poor pass was cut out anyway. Agüero himself was guilty of overplaying on another occasion, taking a touch before shooting when you would normally expect him to strike first time.

Guardiola commented after the match that he failed to convince the players to attack in the first half and said they forgot what to do. It’s the closest he’s come to open criticism of his team and it was fair. The most damning thing is that, for all that Monaco dominated City in the first half and got themselves into a winning position with their 2-0 lead, the Blues actually had the score back in their favour with just 13 minutes to go.

After Leroy Sané’s goal put City back ahead on aggregate, they should have ensured progression into the last eight. The instruction from the bench was to continue attacking; Monaco were on the ropes and the Blues had the chance to finish them. But, clearly, going on the offensive when you have the lead doesn’t mean you abandon your defensive responsibilities. Unfortunately, in the 77^th minute, it all went wrong again. A good free-kick was delivered into the box and with absolutely no awareness of what was behind him, Aleksander Kolarov went chasing the ball. The man behind him was Tiemoué Bakayoko and he headed in to crush City’s spirit. It is for this reason that Kolarov, along with others, are proving themselves not good enough. In the big moments you have to be able to concentrate and read the game; he didn’t, and City are out of the Champions League. It’s not all on him – far from it. It just serves as another example of individuals getting the basics wrong and undermining the wider plan.

Having landed what looked like a knock-out blow with Sané’s goal, City were unprepared when their opponent got back up and hit them harder. With Champions League success being of such prestige to any side that wants to be part of the elite, this result represents a damaging blow and ultimately, a failure for Manchester City. In whichever way you apportion blame, it’s the best example yet of the work Guardiola has to do to bring the team in line with his vision.