Other way round, surely? City's build up play is the slowest imaginable. Press the Silva's and Tevez' fast and hard and they'll pick you off. Sit back, stay compact and they struggle because they have no idea what to do with the width. Then hit them on the counter, exploit how compact they have become and score lots and lot of goals!

Seriously, with the likes of Sterling, Suarez, Gerrard and Sturridge, hitting them on the counter would probably be your best bet. Just my opinion.

I completely agree. We need to go at City, their defence won't be great with Kompany and Toure unavailable. Also Yaya is missing in midfield so we need to take it to them. Now's a good time to play them and we should take advantage of it.

City midfield struggle against us as we always press them and try to cut off supply to their forwards. My main concern is whether the players can cope with 3 matches in a week. I suspect it's one of the reasons BR opted for organisation/pressure rather than pressing vs Arsenal.

Hmm, I am not sure.

City play a slow, slow, quick style.

They don't play with the tempo that Arsenal do, but when they get it to the feet of Tevez, Silva and Aguero the pace quickens. Oddly Zabaleta speeds it up for them too on the overlap.

I don't think we have the tactical versatility to play too many different ways to be honest.

Our best bet is to play our normal game. Press high and try to dominate the ball.

I don't think we made a conscious decision to be so deep against Arsenal. They just pushed us back because the pass quickly and directly (without being long).

City will be happy to have the ball for 5 mins before a forward pass.

Kagawa, IMO you can stop City getting Silva and chums into the game by pressing their deeper midfielders.

Most teams sit back against Cityand it suits City because they usually have enough quality up top to win the match anyway, and it also means their weakness in CM isn't exposed, simply because the likes of Barry aren't pressed and can move it forward, when a bit of pressure would see them struggling to get forward.

Righteous, completely agree with you about City's tempo only upping when they get into the final third, but IMO it's because they don't have very good passers in deeper areas and most teams sit back against them.

They get schooled in the Champions League because there's no creativity at all bar the frontal area from Silva onwards. Their central midfield just looks clueless in the face of teams who don't allow them to get the ball to Silva etc at their own pace.

yea if sit back against city like we did against arsenal...then we are up for more of the same ..

david silva pulling the strings in midfield , and dzeko ,tevez and aguero looking for a sniff......

yaya and kompany are out

Op is spot on they were harried in the cl and couldn't handle it, when real and Ajax sat bk that's when city had success, however there are only a few teams in the league who have the players and bawls to play like that against them

Go flat out, tackle for every ball, don't let the opposition breathe far less think, get as many players in the box (on the Attack, I counted as many as 6-7,Arsenal players in our box in these cons half), keep the pressure on, run till you die, then up the ante and run some more. Yeah, that'll do it. JimmyTheRed

I just hope the players the energy to press them like they need to considering this will be our third hard game in a week.

It's city's 3rd game in a week too, and they are short on numbers. Two tough away games for them too at Stoke and QPR.

Hopefully fitness won't be an issue.

That's true enough righteous, although they do have a deeper squad than us.

I was at the game at Anfield; the atmosphere was just electric, everyone buzzing. I still fancy our chances for 3 points. JimmyTheRed

Considered yourself now unfiltered. Had to email the powers eventually as it wouldnt let me undo it. Maybe they thought i was better off!

You were better off, I wish I could filter myself sometimes!

Really annoying not to have gotten more from our last two games, but also hugely encouraged.

Filtered

I filtered by mistake and the member page wouldnt change so you've been filtered for two weeks. It shows really good progress that we know we should have won at Arsenal and Man City.

Yeah it was on one of the Friday threads where you started mucking about with your filter list or something wasn't it? Ya big eejit

I'm delighted that we're currently beating the smaller teams. We've also performed well against bigger teams whilst admittedly showing some mental fragility, but the more Buck's here the better we'll become in that aspect, hopefully.

I'm delighted at the moment, and confident ahead of the West Brom game. A bit crappy having a match on Monday followed by one on Thursday though.

..and one in Russia at that. I think we'll try and get away with a lesser squad for the game. But Rodgers would spring a suprise if Gerrard and Suarez went. Can see Carra staying home too and Sturridge is tied.

Something like:

Jones

Wisdom Coates Skrtel Enrique

Lucas Allen

Shelvey

Suso Borini Sterling

I'd be happy enough with that, the only real problem is that Lucas is still looking tired (especially towards the end of matches) but we don't look properly balanced without him, and I wouldn't be optimistic away at Zenit without him.

Maybe we could even give Coady a game, he was solid and sensible away at Anzhi. Himself and Allen might be able to sit and protect the defence. But then we'll struggle to go forward.

Oh sod it, can somebody just clone Lucas and be done with it?

No i feel that with the right attitude and instruction we can be soild enough with Coady and Allen (who should be fresh) along with Shelvey.