Are The Players Lazy, Shit Or Both?

[FightingIllini]

Outside of Kane, Ndombele, and Romero (and I guess Gil) the collective technical quality on the ball in the squad, just basic receiving the ball, playing the ball, showing for the ball stuff, is unimaginably low for the amount of money that has been spent.

Some of those players have their positive qualities, Sonny can run and finish with the best of them, Hugo's an elite shot stopper even though he can't distribute, PEH and Skipp are mobile sound tacklers, but you put 8-9 guys that aren't really sound technical passers (the way all 11 Man City players must always be) on the pitch at once and everything is just pained all the time.

And then I don't think the team is lazy per se, but the lack of belief in each other is palpable. Having ex-footballers like Dele, Winks and Doherty having the status of the prominent internationals they once were must just do everyone's head in, the meritocracy is totally distorted in that dressing room.

 

[NorseYid]

Some of these players were in the CL final squad and amongst Pochs best teams.

The worst part is how some of them have let themselves go. It's quite blatant they are not training and eating well or care anymore. Or both.

Someone like Dele looks like he has given up on football already, just doing the absolute minimum to show up to honour the very basics of his contract to get paid.

 

[halothagod]

A sorry bunch of players really.

 

[Stlducks]

A mix of lazy players (Dele, Sanchez, Doherty, Bergwijn), shit players (Winks, Gollini, Sessegnon), average players trying to do too much (Dier, PEH, Lucas), out of form players (Kane and Son) make up our whole team.

Lloris is the only player who has been consistently good this season.

 

[Zest]

Think the problem of this moment, is that they have probably all just engaged a diet change, and, significant uptick in energy, physical and emotional, spent at training.

Also, on top of this higher load, which the better nutrition/recovery Conte will induce in them may buffer, the players will have been pushed to their maximum in training, so probably went into the game hugely carry training knocks, essentially like a pre-season camp/games.

So, Conte should have told them, each game, to treat this game as a 45 minute game, if you are fit enough you will carry on to 60 minutes, if not 45. If you are fit at 60, then tactics is why I may change you.

Especially last night, the players should have been driven from the start, I bet they are all knackered from training and a lowering of sugars/proteins/fats (whatever their demon) in their diets. So their metabolisms are all over the place, as one thing the body does is deal with regularity, shit, good, whatever, if regular the body copes, change not soo much!

Hope Conte see's this deeply about stuff.

Get them on the good ways and this squad had some qualities (Bergwijn I think could be an epic RWB as others say). Bet his lungs haven't been nourished since he's been here, let's see what they can do in 3 months...

It's going to be a tough 3 months though, brutal many on here would say.

 

[Nuts]

Think the problem of this moment, is that they have probably all just engaged a diet change, and, significant uptick in energy, physical and emotional, spent at training.

That might account for their lack of energy but they should still be able to pass a ball accurately. So much of our passing is abysmal. Kane's performance against Mura was his worst technical display ever. Really, really poor. I don't think that was because Conte hid the Heinz.

 

[StripiestPilot]

It’s a bit of everything isn’t it? There are some bad players. There are some talented but lazy players. There are some players who used to be good but have been ravaged by injuries.

There are very few players in the squad that could compete for a place in the starting XI for City, Chelsea or Liverpool. Realistically we have 3. Kane, Son and Lloris. There was a time when every player in our XI could compete with the starting XI of those clubs. We went from 11 quality players to 3. We went from having hungry squad players to having lazy reserves. It’s not that complicated to explain why we are now rubbish.

Players on the bench for Chelsea are now vastly better than what we have in the starting XI.

 

[Zest]

Spurs

If there's a reason to be shit, we'll manifest it from within you.

 

[Kane's left]

I honestly don't know. How can Gio Lo Celso be so important for Argentina but so shit for us?

How can Ndombele so such glimpses of quality but never make his mark on a game - ditto Bergwijn starts for Netherlands.

Rodon is loved by Wales fans, Lucas can so what he did in Amsterdam,.

in 16/17 Dele got 18 PL goals?! how can it all have gone so wrong?

Is it that Eriksen/Dembele/Vertonghen/Alderwiereld were the glue?

18 goals??? BS.



*Checks google*

Where did it all go wrong my son?!?!? :contetellmemore:

 

[StevenPL]

We played well without Dembele, Vertonghen and Toby over the years. I'm not sure i ever remember us playing well without Eriksen. When his form started to go a bit in March 2019 i dont think its coincidence the team suddenly looked shite. He made us tick and we haven't looked the same since. Its like when we lost Carrick and Modric, the fulcrum of the team went and we looked a bit ruderless.

Dembele walked out December 2018 - have a look at the results literally from that day (literally) . We could win without Eriksen back then, we could win without Dembele back then, but without both we were always fckd. Personally I feel Dembele set the standard - he made everyone better. He was the ultimate MFr! Reckon erkisen knew it as well...

 

[AussieYiddo]

I think we have a good starting XI but no depth and a lot of our key players are unmotivated (especially Kane but also Tanguy and Dele).

Off the top of my head if I were to categorise our squad

Premier League winning quality
Kane
Son
Lloris

Champions League quality
Hojbjerg
Romero

Upper Mid table
Ndombele
Lucas
Emerson
Bergwijn
Reguilon
Lo Celso

Mid table or lower
Dier
Skipp
Dele
Gil
Winks
Sanchez
Tanganga
Sessegnon
Rodon
Davies
Gollini

 

[deadleyledley]

I think we have a good starting XI but no depth and a lot of our key players are unmotivated (especially Kane but also Tanguy and Dele).

Off the top of my head if I were to categorise our squad

Premier League winning quality
Kane
Son
Lloris

Champions League quality
Hojbjerg
Romero

Upper Mid table
Ndombele
Lucas
Emerson
Bergwijn
Reguilon
Lo Celso

Mid table or lower
Dier
Skipp
Dele
Gil
Winks
Sanchez
Tanganga
Sessegnon
Rodon
Davies
Gollini

No way PEH is CL quality.

 

[BAE32]

No way PEH is CL quality.

"CL Quality" is fucking hilarious as some sort of made-up metric. You remember us making the CL final with a CM pairing of Winks and Sissoko? Are they CL Quality? What even is that ffs.

 

[Stlducks]

I think we have a good starting XI but no depth and a lot of our key players are unmotivated (especially Kane but also Tanguy and Dele).

Off the top of my head if I were to categorise our squad

Premier League winning quality
Kane
Son
Lloris

Champions League quality
Hojbjerg
Romero

Upper Mid table
Ndombele
Lucas
Emerson
Bergwijn
Reguilon
Lo Celso

Mid table or lower
Dier
Skipp
Dele
Gil
Winks
Sanchez
Tanganga
Sessegnon
Rodon
Davies
Gollini

I agree with most of this but would drop Lo Celso to midtable to lower. He has not done anything since arriving to prove he's above midtable sides.

So far Davies under Conte has looked solid.

The only other ones I would possibly change would be Skipp, Tanganga, Gil and Rodon. They have shown potential to be much higher but for the time being I would agree they are lower table but they have potential to move up. The rest do not.

 

[JIMINHO]

My opinion is we underestimated the influence Eriksen had on this team (I didn’t ). He played essentially every game, consistently ran the most in each game, and used to ping that ball all over the field which just made us tick. Since he said he wanted to leave, we’ve been on a downward trajectory. Has there been other reasons that have contributed; yes, but he was the player that made this team what it was. Unpopular opinion perhaps but we have not been able to replace him. We have two world class attackers in Son and Kane, we have a middling defence but our midfield has been absolutely since he left.Lo Celso and Ndombele were supposed to be the answers but one is constantly injured and the other is lazy, albeit extremely talented. Until we find someone who can link up defence with midfield and get the speed of our game up, we’re not going to be a top team.

Rant over.

 

[KaneDomBadBoy]

Premier League winning quality
Kane

 

[Nuts]

Where does that leave Doherty?

He's a championship donkey at best. A nothing player. I cannot recall a single game where he's shone in even the slightest way.

 

[Zomb]

Outside of Kane, Ndombele, and Romero (and I guess Gil) the collective technical quality on the ball in the squad, just basic receiving the ball, playing the ball, showing for the ball stuff, is unimaginably low for the amount of money that has been spent.

Some of those players have their positive qualities, Sonny can run and finish with the best of them, Hugo's an elite shot stopper even though he can't distribute, PEH and Skipp are mobile sound tacklers, but you put 8-9 guys that aren't really sound technical passers (the way all 11 Man City players must always be) on the pitch at once and everything is just pained all the time.

And then I don't think the team is lazy per se, but the lack of belief in each other is palpable. Having ex-footballers like Dele, Winks and Doherty having the status of the prominent internationals they once were must just do everyone's head in, the meritocracy is totally distorted in that dressing room.

Spot on. The lack of technical quality is shocking and we simply have to get a comfortable footballer into the middle third. People are blinded by the work rate of PEH, Lucas etc as though this offsets their inability to control a ball.

For now, I think we have to play Gill and Ndombele somewhere just to raise the technical ability of the side and give us a chance of progressing the ball into the final third

Players like Dier, Davies and Emerson are good enough on the ball (without being particularly good technically) as long as the general level in midfield is raised

 

[Archie]

There seems to be a significant group that are just going through the motions and pretending to be EPL players. These uncaring players are there for the money and nothing else. I expect Conte to get rid of 3 or 4 of these in January. For me theres no professionalism, and they dont mind embarrassing themselves as long as the wages keep rolling in.

 

[yes]

Dembele walked out December 2018 - have a look at the results literally from that day (literally) . We could win without Eriksen back then, we could win without Dembele back then, but without both we were always fckd. Personally I feel Dembele set the standard - he made everyone better. He was the ultimate MFr! Reckon erkisen knew it as well...

He was arguably our most important player. Letting him leave in that January window was one of the biggest mistakes we made. No doubt in my mind that if we had Dembele playing in the Champions League final over Sissoko we’d have beaten Liverpool.

Absolutely criminal decision.

That and starting an unfit, out of form Harry Kane, of course.