Manuel Pellegrini’s regular one-up system is today coming under question with one of two fans wondering whether Albian Ajeti is ever going to get a realistic chance to show what he’s got.
Seb Haller has looked an even better striker when Manu Lanzini is in the team and drifts in from the left to join him in a more central role.
And in this short blog ClaretandHugh follower Mooro32uk asks the question: “When will the young Swiss striker join the big fella up front?”
By Mooro32uk
I really cannot understand why MP is so against two up front.
Ajeti seems very much like Hernandez, a box player, and needs to play off the main striker. As we’ve seen in the cup games, he struggles on his own.
Against some teams we are crying out for such a system. Haller is living on scraps on his own, his great ability is heading down and holding the ball up for others.
Unfortunately the others are quite often not there quickly enough. This isn’t criticism of the players just the system. Big teams have the ability to play both ways.
COYI
When you say “no one plays with 2 strikers any more”, you seem to forget Arsenal, Spurs, Liverpool etc. In fact almost half the Premier league teams. Football formations go in cycles. They are usually dictated by the abilities of our current crop of players. As we play with fast attacking full backs, we need to have more than one target. It seems that whenever we have a fast break, we get to the position when the ball should be delivered only for the man in possession to stop and play the ball backwards or inside. Teams that play with only one forward usually have a couple of fast attacking midfielders who support the lone striker. We don’t seem to be able to do that. Haller runs himself into the ground. He wins many long balls forward but has nobody picking these up or playing off him. I’d like to see two up front tried with the personnel we have at the moment. We don’t have to be so inflexible.
What about 3 up like Liverpool Mooro ?
Go with the gegenpress, city also do this 3 man press as do many others now https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5QRWryN3okY
Is a decent video explaining it if any are interested.
MP has played two up front at City, with Negredo as the second striker so he isn’t averse to it, also when we chase the game he will play two up top as he did last year at times bringing Hernandez on. Ajeti doesn’t look like he understands MP’s system, until he gets that I expect we won’t see him starting. I do hold hope that when he is ready he will be a real asset
Agree and have been saying this for weeks. It was painfully obvious against Villa
We get trounced every time we play 2 strikers. No one plays two strikers anymore. Why are you even discussing this.