QPR face a tough assignment on Tuesday with champions Man City in town and bang in form. Roberto Mancini’s men look well placed for another assault on the championship come May.
Not since Blackburn Rovers won the Premier League in 1995 only to collapse to a seventh place finish the season after has a reigning champion received such little press coverage during its defence of the trophy.
Back then there was a sense – correct as it turned out – that Blackburn’s time had been and gone. Jack Walker had arrived, he’d built the stadium, he’d hired the high profile manager, he’d spent the money, they’d won promotion, they’d finished fourth and then runners up, they’d finally won the league and the job was done. After lifting the trophy at Anfield, manager Kenny Dalglish stepped down and Rovers became the latest club to fall foul of believing Ray Harford was as good a manager as he was a coach and gone into decline. The European Cup campaign was brief and inglorious – notable only for Graeme Le Saux and David Batty fighting themselves during one match in Moscow – and while that was certainly a story at the time, by the end of the season they’d finished seventh and few media outlets were bothering to cover them in any depth any more. In 1999 Rovers were relegated.
Man City, like Blackburn, have drawn press only for their failure in Europe and the misbehaviour of their players – or more specifically the constant on and off field antics of Mario Balotelli. Take him out of the equation and I don’t think I’d have actually read anything on City in any kind of depth for three months now since they were eliminated from the Champions League. At a recent press conference Roberto Mancini laughed and exclaimed “fucking hell” when the first question was once again about Balotelli. The fact is, from a media point of view, the nutty striker is about the only point of interest in the current City set up.
But City, unlike Blackburn, are still well in the race to defend their crown. With six games to play last season they were eight points behind Man Utd but came home with a wet sail, beating United at Eastlands in the process, to overhaul the deficit and then seal their first title in 44 years with the latest of late shows against QPR on the final day of the season. Now, with 15 games still to play, they’re only five points back and they still have a fixture with United to come. They’re well in the hunt, but the stories about Van Persie’s explosive start to life on the other side of town, Arsenal’s continued phobia of the transfer market, and particularly Chelsea’s self inflicted collapse, are of more interest than anything Man City are doing at the moment if you judge things on column inches.
Part of this is undoubtedly because City are quite dull to watch – although I’m sure Roberto Mancini would describe it as ‘efficient’ rather than boring. The title success of last season may have owed much to a late surge, but it was built on an extraordinary start to the campaign of ten wins and a draw. When City won at Loftus Road on Bonfire Night they looked more like Kevin Keegan’s Newcastle than Roberto Mancini’s Inter – defensively slack but happy in the knowledge that they could, in as much as this is ever the case in football, score at will. They came into that game on a run of five straight league wins in which they’d scored 19 goals – just shy of four a game – and won 6-1 at Old Trafford. There was a feeling that having sorted the defensive side out first – the 0-0 draw they set up to attain and won in ball acheing fashion at Arsenal the previous season was as dreary as football gets – Mancini had let his side off the leash.
If he had done, it’s definitely back on the chain this season. Once again they come into this match having won their last five, but unlike last time it’s the goals against total that is more impressive than the score column: City haven’t conceded in their last five matches but have ‘only’ scored 11 of their own. This is much more George Graham’s Arsenal than anything Keegan ever presided over, and is much more the sort of thing you’d expect to see from an Italian manager. They’ve kept clean sheets in seven of the last eight fixtures. At Arsenal recently Mancini fielded a deep midfield three of James Milner, Gareth Barry and Javi Garcia. Even before the home team ended the contest early by getting a man sent off in the eighth minute and conceding two before the half hour mark it was sleep inducing.
Mancini ,though, will be delighted.
Early in the season he grumbled about progress in the transfer market, and then seemed to be deliberately causing himself problems by flitting between a back three and back four – often changing between them a couple of times during the same game. City leaked badly as a result, conceding 18 goals in their first ten games and not keeping a clean sheet until their eleventh outing against Sunderland.
The Champions League again proved beyond them, but given that they pulled Borussia Dortmund, Ajax and Real Madrid I’m not convinced that as big a story or surprise as people made out. I went to the Dortmund Ajax game in Amsterdam and the quality was absolutely exceptional, quite out of the ordinary, so it’s no disgrace or crisis for City not to be able to compete at that stage just yet however much money they’ve spent. Failure at the group stage again next season will raise valid questions though.
Now they’re ticking over nicely, winning routinely, going about their business quietly and, potentially, slipping in under the radar. Perhaps Mancini even quite likes the occasional Balotelli incident, to keep the attention away from his team. They’re well placed, and nobody seems to have noticed.
Man City regular Stevie Williams is back, kindly giving up his time to answer a few questions on the club for LFW. Yes, he was there when they were shit – Stevie and I used to be the lower league representatives in our secondary school class of Manchester United supporters back in the day.
Man City currently five points behind in their title defence – can you do it? Will you do it? Is the general opinion of fans optimistic or not so much?
Five points behind, hmmm, should be fairly easy to win the league again now - I mean we only gave ourselves six games and an eight point disadvantage last season so.....
In all honesty, yes we can do it. There is a long way to go yet and as we see week in week out any team can get a result in this league, you just have to look at yourselves at Chelsea to see that. Both City and United will drop points before the end of the season that’s inevitable, hopefully they drop more. Generally around City the mood is an upbeat one, we’re second in the league and retaining the title is well within reach.
What, if anything, is the reason you're five points behind? Man Utd got better, City got worse or stood still? Has that faffing about with a three man defence at the start of the season cost you?
The reason is the failure to see teams off. The free scoring City of last year that was tearing teams apart seems, for one reason or another, to have lost its spark. We still haven't lost many but we have drawn too many. United have signed Van Persie and unfortunately he has been the difference - take his goals away and where would they be?
The messing around with the league’s strongest defence has confused most but it has now settled down and yet again is proving much more mean. We have just started to show glimpses of last year so I think it will be an interesting second half of the season to say the least.
Roberto Mancini seemed disgruntled with the transfer business done in the summer. What new players did you need and didn't get, what positions need strengthening? Any sign of any movement in January?
Well, as I just touched on, United got him and we didn't. I don’t really think we needed much other than cover for Yaya Toure and a decent back up centre back. That position has been sorted with a surprising replacement of Lescott but some transfers were very strange - Scott Sinclair for example. I fail to see the point in that particular swoop. I'm not sure anything will happen this window, maybe release a few players and turn a few loans permanent, however Mancini does like a January loan of his own.
How secure is Mancini? We hear talk of Mourinho and others eventually ending up with you.
I hope it’s very secure, he’s the most successful manager I have seen in my time supporting the club. I can’t see the club going the right direction by changing the manager. I believe with the hype that now surrounds City every time a manager/player has a falling out or something similar with their club, they will then almost definitely be linked with City. The same could be said at Chelsea although they tend to act on media speculation. As always, Forza Mancini.
Why have you struggled in your two Champions League campaigns so far?
I would say we have only struggled in one - we had a total of ten points in our first go which is a total that would see you through most years. So it was disappointing but not a complete failure for a first go. This year I thought we were rubbish - far too negative at home. It was a tough group but to be the best you have to beat the beat the best and City aren't quite there yet. I don’t know why because the individuals we have are certainly good enough. To be honest I, like most City fans, am still over the moon just to see us competing in that.
Mario Balotelli… discuss. Is it time to cut your losses with this guy? Milan said to be interested…
Mario Balotelli.......... the sooner he is sold/given away, the better. He brings nothing to the club. As a footballer for Manchester City he has not yet done anything other than score penalties. There is no doubting his ability, he looks a brilliant footballer when he is playing for Italy. Mancini needs to realise it isn’t going to work and if Milan are interested someone should be helping him pack. There are people who love him and think he is going to be the greatest the world has seen, that isn’t going to happen at City. I would be happy to never see him in a City shirt again and would much rather see John Guidetti as fourth choice striker.
On the pitch the early debating point was Roberto Mancini’s apparent fascination with switching away from the back four system they won the league with, into a back three set up. There’s no reason this shouldn’t have worked per se – given the ability of Vincent Kompany, Joleon Lescott being left footed to add balance to the central three, and Pablo Zabaletta being as big an attacking threat as he is a defensive stalwart seemingly ideal for either the right wing back or right centre half position. It just didn’t work though, and City conceded a lot of goals early on both because the system was failing, and as they were often wildly changing between the three and the four during games.
The victim of this was not only the system, but also Joleon Lescott who has started just one of the last eight in the league. The first choice back four – Zabaletta, Kompany, Matija Nastasic and Gael Clichy – has kept clean sheets in seven of the last eight games including the last five. Lescott may well get his chance to stake a claim this Tuesday night at Loftus Road though. Kompany limped out of Saturday’s FA Cup game at Stoke with what looked like a hamstring injury and Lescott would be the obvious replacement if he is out for this fixture. Kompany was out for this fixture last season as well and replaced on that occasion by Stefan Savic who endured a tough single season at City after arriving from Borca and has since been offloaded to Fiorentina. The Italian side brought him in to replace Nastasic who came the other way and has looked altogether more comfortable with the Premier League although Kompany remains key, and given that QPR almost won this fixture last season with Jay Bothroyd and Hiedar Helguson battering the City centre halves the absence of the influential Belgian is a big boost if it happens.
The return fixture at Eastlands last season will obviously live long in the memory as the day City scored twice in injury time to snatch their first title in 44 years. QPR fought back from one down in that match to lead 2-1, scoring one through Jamie Mackie when actually down to ten men after Joey Barton’s sending off. This was seen as a typical sort of cock up for Man City to make given their love of farce through the years but looking at it more analytically, the collapse was largely caused by the withdrawal of Yaya Toure before half time through injury when City led 1-0. It meant that even the absence of Barton in the second half didn’t have as much influence on proceedings as it might because City had no domineering presense of their own in that midfield area once Toure had gone off. Encouragingly, he is absent on Tuesday as well at the African Nations Cup. City without Kompany and Toure are usually vulnerable – hey, we might be able to keep this down to three or four!
You can tell when Roberto Mancini is expecting a tough game and/or sees the fixture as being important because he’ll always field a tight, deep lying midfield three made up from a mixture Toure, Gareth Barry, James Milner and Javi Garcia. It’s quite some barrier, while not exactly lending itself to the entertainment factor of the game. QPR are far more likely to face a more open City, which Mancini will pick to face opponents he fears will just try and sit deep and tight themselves and hold out for as long as possible. Given the recent tactics and performances from QPR against Spurs and West Ham it’s fair to expect more of the same on Tuesday so we may well see a City side more like the one that started at Norwich where Edin Dzeko, Sergio Aguero, Samir Nasri and David Silva all started with only Barry and Toure in the middle of midfield. Nasri’s sending off that day, and subsequent three goals conceded, seems to have stung Mancini slightly as he’s picked the deep lying three ever since, including for home matches against Stoke and Fulham.
Personally having watched QPR this season I’d pick as many of the creative, attacking players as I could in the City team and just blitz this game. Assuming Shaun Derry starts in front of the back four with Jamie Mackie and Shaun Wright-Phillips offering defensive input down the flanks the left and right channels that run between those three will be key. Get the likes of Aguero and Tevez running into there with Dzeko occupying the centre halves and width provided by Silva and possibly Nasri as well and City could easily just blow QPR off the park.
The absence of Kompany and Toure is encouraging, and if Mancini sticks to the more defensive outlook he’s had this season then maybe QPR can get something. But the attacking options available to the visitors are fearsome, and if City fancy returning to the gung ho attitude of last autumn for one night only they could turn this into a bloodbath.
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