'Disjointed' Man City's confidence has taken 'huge hit', say Rachel Brown-Finnis and Owen Hargreaves
ByOli Gent
Updated 27/11/2024 at 13:11 GMT
TNT Sports experts Rachel Brown-Finnis and Owen Hargreaves said that Manchester City's confidence has taken a "huge hit," with Pep Guardiola's side looking "disjointed" after they threw away a 3-0 lead to draw 3-3 with Feyenoord at the Etihad Stadium in the UEFA Champions League. Erling Haaland and Ilkay Gundogan got the goals, but a stunning late comeback from the Dutch side earned them a point.
‘Confidence has taken a huge hit’ – Hargreaves on Man City collapse against Feyenoord
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TNT Sports experts Rachel Brown-Finnis and Owen Hargreaves believe that "disjointed" Manchester City’s confidence has taken "a huge hit."
Pep Guardiola’s side's winless run continued in the UEFA Champions League, as the Citizens let a 3-0 lead slip against Feyenoord, who roared back to snatch a 3-3 draw at the Etihad Stadium.
Erling Haaland put the hosts up with a penalty a minute before half-time, before Ilkay Gundogan doubled the lead five minutes into the second half.
Haaland had his second three minutes later, and Guardiola made three changes with 22 minutes left to play, as Kevin de Bruyne replaced Ilkay Gundogan, Jahmai Simpson-Pusey came on for Nathan Ake, and James McAtee replaced Phil Foden.
However, TNT pundits Brown-Finnis and Hargreaves believe that the changes "disjointed the spine" of the side, with Guardiola thinking that the game "was won."
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Highlights: Man City let three-goal lead slip to draw with Feyenoord
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"When you come to a game and you’re 3-0 up, you think that’s the stop of the negative momentum and possibly the start of an upward trajectory," Brown-Finnis explained on the TNT Sports Goals Xtra Show.
"You look at the analysis of the substitutes coming on in key positions. Why not keep Ake on? I know there’s sports science and data behind it, but those decisions will come under scrutiny in a mess like this.
"Clearly, [Manuel] Akanji and Ake are the two most capable centre-halves that he’s missing. Simpson-Pusey played in the last one. It’s that lack of cohesion; there’s not a lot of playing time together between centre-halves.
"It’s a critical position. It has a knock-on effect with the goalkeeper. He came flying out for the third goal because he was covering his centre-halves. They clumped really close together, and it was a simple pass through to bypass them.
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"Tonight we can look at the reality of it. The substitutions that were made right down the core. De Bruyne came on for Foden, Ake came off for Simpson-Pusey, and McAtee came on for Gundogan.
"That’s when Feyenoord got their first goal. That spine looked disjointed. Whether they were poor decisions, whether players came on and made poor individual decisions, but it seemed to unravel from there.
"It seems that they didn’t have the composure to reset at 3-1 and galvanise themselves. It fell away from there."
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Hargreaves, himself a former Manchester City player, noted that City have had plentiful injuries in central defence, and that has played a big part in the "huge hit" the Citizens have suffered with their confidence levels.
"They’ve had a huge amount of injuries," Hargreaves said.
"They’re missing a lot of centre-backs. But confidence, they've taken a huge hit. We’re seeing a lot of key mistakes that even the best teams normally wouldn’t make. He thought the game was over. He thought it was won."
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