Missing in action for the past six weeks: Manchester’s city of pizzazz. Here he was absent again, in recent performances boasting what has become an odd, yet recognized face in Pep Guardiola’s former top team. The next stop on the European tour will be Paris in January, with PSG also fighting for a place in the game.
Now there is a deaf element about the sunken city. The side is running on a losing streak – they certainly do – but for this group champion to lose their seventh in 10 games and extend their upset to a quick run of one victory in the season they are playing.
It’s disappointing for Guardiola, who admitted his team won more than they should have from the start to the set Tottenham in the Carabao Cup on October 30. The manager’s proposal comes before this latest comeback, perhaps as a geometric fan.
This does not work and pro Juventus sealed a valuable win thanks to Dusan Vlahovic’s 53rd-minute header and a second goal that broke when Timothy Weah flew the ball in from the right and Weston McKennie thundered home.
Each substitute was sent by Thiago Motta. His opposite number, 75 minutes, had led to nothing: one sign of Guardiola’s numbness and flooding his charges.
At kick-off, City are 20th and Juve 22nd, each with eight points, four from the final automatic berth. This was cast as a clash of two continental giants who needed a victory and to provide a boost in return to domestic services. In the past weeks, Guardiola broke out of isolation, an isolation that resulted from serial losses. For the first time during the nine years that he had governed the city, he showed that the injuries were to be mitigated, although here he was called a strong man.
Ilkay Gündogan lined up smartly as a holding midfielder, and had Kevin De Bruyne and Jack Grealish as twin players. He also had Rico Lewis at left-back and his defensive fragility was exposed more than once, as he was overcome by Francisco Conceição and Juve earned a corner.
Too many mistakes is one of Guardiola’s diagnoses of his side’s woes. The Catalan demanded his charges play “simple”, then saw Lewis and Josko Gvardiol make a thunderous jump, who easily missed Grealish’s goal near the Italian’s penalty area.
Gündogan and Kyle Walker did the same: each found Nicolai Savona rather than Jérémy Doku from the left. Another instance of this stupidity caused Guardiola to shake his head. When De Bruyne placed a man, Erling Haaland’s silly touch had the ball ricocheting into his fingers.
The city prospers with the gnare, the tiger, and this time the fugitives are remembered. Doku scampered infield, De Bruyne read his run, created an underlap, possession was freed, and a quick cross enabled Juve’s bodies to throw the ball clear.
Walker – strangely – seems to have been written everywhere as suddenly geriatric and slow as a running back. If the right-back is an easy patsy for City’s ills – he is 34, and can be slowed down by a fracture – the mistake that Vlahovic brought down Ederson’s goal had some closing career obituaries in a told-you-so way.
The richer half of the city was the same as the newer one. They lacked ambition and confidence: the status quo for the winners of the first four Achaean titles, which will also seem foreign when looking back at this season.
Leap-leads to shock the city must be required to what they were and what Guardiola can be sure of again. De Bruyne made a moment that could have been tricky, but Haaland’s line flowed. A swivel-and-drag was followed by a cute pass that put Juve and Haaland in wrong. But he could not finish, and Guardiola kicked in frustration; not the first time.
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His next act was clapping his hands over his head for excessive encouragement and certainly fittingly following Walker blasting a short pass straight to De Bruyne. Up went Guardiola’s arms and the flat tables continued the city’s pattern.
Thiago Mottae stuck in his snows, and could not hold together in any order, so the city kindly helped them with a mime fortifier. After Federico Gatti’s scissor kick was deflected by Ederson, Gvardiol’s clearance was lost to Walker, the ball giving way to Manuel Locatelli. Crossed, Vlahovic headed and, although it was straight at the goalkeeper of the city, the ball left his chest and was squeezed into the bottom left corner, despite a desperate dive.
Juve up to 14th, City two places to 22nd. Grealish’s danced foot slips at Bernardo Silva but his shot is blocked. Rúben Dias spoke of the team’s woes as an opportunity to watch the character, but Ederson once again poured in a cross and troubled City.
Where the carousel jump-play? and a certain swagger before the finish line? As in the first season, Guardiola’s conviction was lacking. Then the trophy went to the city. Let them do it again this year.