Manchester City have slumped to third in the Premier League after three consecutive defeats, leaving them six points behind leaders Arsenal. The international break gives manager Enzo Maresca time to address the growing problems in his squad.
The Italian made a dream start after succeeding Pep Guardiola in the summer. He led the club to a record seven consecutive wins at the beginning of the season. Since then, City have lost to Aston Villa, Brighton and Nottingham Forest. In September, the club were found guilty of breaking the Premier League’s financial rules, and matches have continued while they await the outcome of their appeal. With possible sanctions hanging over them, is City’s recent form down to psychological issues, or are there tactical problems Maresca needs to address?
The psychological impact
Renowned sports psychologist Dr Paul McCarthy, who has 25 years’ experience working with top clubs in England, Scotland, Germany and France, says players’ personal and professional lives both influence how they perform. When situations become disrupted, he says, staff need to “piece together a jigsaw”.
“Players are like everyone else – they talk about what is going on in their own lives and things that are topical, especially about uncertain events,” McCarthy said. “It generates communication with a lot of stories and rumour and over time if there are enough losses, there often becomes a reduced collective efficacy.”
He explained that collective efficacy is a squad’s belief in its ability to do what it needs to do to win. Past success can be shaken by consecutive defeats, and City have certainly endured a rough spell since their strong opening.
Asked whether the uncertainty surrounding the appeal could affect players’ focus, McCarthy said: “Yeah, that would be a very reasonable human response.”
“When people are uncertain about their future, that uncertainty leads to a lack of perceived control, so uncertainty is often more stressful than bad news and the research shows that,” he added. “So while you are waiting and you don’t know the outcome, you are uncertain of where you are and there is that lack of control for a lot of people – they come to training, they play their games and it’s outside of their responsibility.”
Defensive cracks appear
City were top of the table after a flawless start, but their form has changed. They bounced back from the guilty verdict by beating 10-man Liverpool at Anfield, then narrowly overcame Ipswich at the Etihad Stadium. Those wins have not been enough to stop the slide, with defensive issues exposed and individual mistakes proving costly.
In their first seven games of the season, City conceded no goals as a result of individual errors. That has changed sharply in the past three matches, with four mistakes from players contributing to goals. City have conceded 13 goals in 10 league games, their highest total at this stage of a season since 2008-09, when they had let in 16.
Tactical questions
Maresca has favoured a more front-footed approach. He has used a 3-1-6 shape more permanently this season, trading a second holding midfielder for an extra attacking midfielder. He first explained the idea at Chelsea, when he described moving counters into a 3-2-2-3 shape before pushing one player up to create the 3-1-6. He had employed six attackers against Inter Milan to outnumber their back five. A team full of quality footballers has logic in playing in a more imposing manner, but the success of any tactic depends on the skills of the players asked to carry it out.
The biggest questions surround Elliot Anderson and his midfield partners. Anderson is naturally a roaming midfielder, and at Nottingham Forest he defended intensely, pressed high and wide, and contributed to attacks. This season, Maresca and his staff have tried to mould him into a more sitting midfielder following the departure of Rodri in the summer. Learning that role will take time, as it did for Rodri when he first joined.
Anderson has largely impressed, but he has played to his habits. He often steps out of the holding position to press or track opponents, looking to win the ball back. Clever opponents have used this to drag him out of position and then find players through the middle. With City pressing high and often in a man-to-man fashion, Anderson has had to cover more space, while his midfield partners lack the physicality needed to support him.
When City have the ball, Enzo Fernandez, who is often one of the midfield three, makes frequent attacking runs into the final third. This can leave City with as few as two or three players behind the ball, offering opponents favourable conditions to counter-attack if they break the initial press. In one example, City lose possession with Anderson drawn wide and Fernandez remaining high on the far side, leaving City exposed in the middle.
For Maresca, the issue is less about shape and more about losing the ball in the first place. After the defeat to Forest, he said: “You concede transitions when you lose the ball, and when you don’t win duels.”
The players behind Anderson raise further concerns. Gianluigi Donnarumma is not renowned for his ball-playing ability, and the defenders are serviceable on the ball but have made costly errors under pressure when playing out from the back this season. Against Forest, City had four players near or behind the ball before Josko Gvardiol was dispossessed, and Forest, with four attackers of their own, scored from that turnover.
Guardiola mitigated some of these issues last season by asking midfielders to take on more ball-playing responsibility. The departures of Rodri and, especially, Bernardo Silva, who would drop deep and take City from their own goal into midfield alone, have made the problems more obvious. Anderson is a good player, but he cannot single-handedly resolve build-up play in the way Bernardo Silva did. Ayyoub Bouaddi may be able to fill that role, as he showed against Brazil’s press at the World Cup.