I don't see either team making alot of the game since both are thru to the next round. The only record i want to see is Bayern winning back to back CL trophy.
MUTU wrote:The referee for this match is David Fernández Borbalán, who hails from Spain.
He has given 77 yellow cards and 4 red cards in 15 matches refereed this season [source]
Well, let's just hope Boa will not go for a direct red, again. Again because he got a RC in the last CL game last year too. RC against City earlier is forgiven by me.
Also, he is already out of the weekend game owing to one match suspension as he earned his 5th YC against Bremen.
'To be successful, you have to give everything.' - Bastian Schweinsteiger
I think that this game could present an interesting tactical study.
There are rumours floating around that Manchester City may field a weakened team. That would be no surprise, since they would have a mammoth task in beating Bayern by three goals at home to top the group, they have already secured second place, and they risk having their confidence rocked, if Bayern whop their first XI, and risk facing Arsenal with a bunch of tired players in a more important game at the weekend. No, the rumours may have substance.
That still leaves an interesting game. Manchester City usually play a 4-4-2 formation, and get away with it in the Premier League – even quite successfully at times. Most tactical theorists recognise, however, that against top competition 4-4-2 can be dismantled by opponents who play 4-2-3-1, 4-1-4-1 or (using a false striker) 4-2-4. The extra midfielders, in these midfielder-oriented formations, grasp control of the game and the result should be predictable.
Bayern’s injury problems mean that they may play a traditional striker rather than a false nine – ie Mandzukic or Pizarro up front rather than Goetze. I’d rather see a false nine start in this game, however. eg:
A traditional striker can be brought on later. (And, really I should find a better term than “traditional striker”, since Guardiola will never use a traditional striker as an out-and-out traditional striker, in the sense we have seen and expected it from other managers in the past. The traditional striker is almost a dead concept. Mandzukic, Pizarro and even Lewandowski, if he arrives, will play partly as a front man and partly as a false nine, weaving in and out of the front four to create more variation in attack.)
Back to Bayern’s formation tomorrow night, though: that formation really forces Pellegrini’s hand. If he starts with his preferred 4-4-2, the two strikers must track back a lot to help out in midfield, and must virtually reinvent themselves as false nines. Or, if he plays with just one striker, that striker must probably do the same too. Moreover, the unfamiliar formation of a single striker and the unfamiliar selection of players, playing under intense pressure from Bayern, will be a recipe for things really falling apart.
Manchester City’s first team managed only 45% possession against Southampton at the weekend. The same first team, in the same form, would probably struggle to achieve 40% possession against Bayern, and their weakened XI would probably struggle to achieve 30% possession. That means that there’ll be a lot of activity in Manchester City’s third of the pitch, where they are known to have a poor defence and an under-confident goalkeeper. Bayern’s attack has also just hit form with high numbers of chances being created and, more importantly, a good conversion rate.
The odds are stacked in Bayern’s favour. Manchester City might get a win or a draw in this game, but either would be a shock result.
"Wherever that man went, he went gratefully." --------- Attributed to Seamus Heaney ---------
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