In this article, the tactics of Manchester City under Pep Guardiola in early 25-26 is going to be analysed based on their first three league games in the 25-26 season.
In Possession
Playing out
The difference from last season when playing out from the back is more involvement of Haaland by dropping deep to link up with other midfielders frequently.
Along with Haaland, Reijnders, the new arrival from AC Milan, occupied the pocket of the space in between the lines as Rico Lewis drifted inside to push him up in the first two league games. This looks like the trend system which has two false 9s up front, which is often used by teams with the intention of playing out from the back against high pressure, even though Man City’s version is the combination with a false fullback.
The biggest concern for City now is the departure of Ederson. In the first three games, James Trafford has played in goal, but as Ederson’s quality of playing short under the pressure calmly or playing over the opposition pressure is irreplaceable, the ability of playing out from the back should have been degraded. The goal City conceded against Spurs from the mistake made by Trafford was a matter of decision making and it won’t be changed soon, it’ll surely take time to fix. Donnarumma came to City, but he is not a suitable goalkeeper if they want to draw the opposition pressure out by playing short and play through it. So, after the international break in September, how they use the goalkeeper will be one of the biggest talking points.
Positional Structure
In the middle third, they set their traditional 3-2-5 with Rico Lewis as the false fullback in the first two games, but against Brighton, Nunes played as the right fullback and Pep pushed both fullbacks high up the pitch.
The image below shows their 3-2-5 system against Tottenham.
With this system, Man City are excellent at breaking the first line and two examples are shown in the following illustrations. Especially against Wolves, as the opponent often set their defensive shape in the midfield, City could easily play through the first line and find a spare player in between the lines in the positional way.
In this image, Nico González dropped in between the opposition striker and winger and carried the ball forward to break the first line to find Bernardo Silva in between the lines. This is a great example of creating a 3v2 numerical advantage and progressing it to overload in the midfield.
Another one is here.
The holding midfielders dropped into the back line to push the centre backs wide and dragged the opposition winger to let the centre back free and carry the ball forward. The principle is similar to the first one, which is creating an overload at the back and progressing it by carrying the ball forward.
So basically, when the game is static thanks to the opposition team prioritising to set the defensive block, Man City can do whatever they want. They are masters of positional play. They can do everything which can be imaginable on the tactics board.
Struggles against Man-Oriented Approach
On the other hand, when the opponents increase the pressure on the ball by shifting zonal marking to man marking, they can be in trouble. The illustration below shows how Brighton defended against City’s positional play.
Especially on the City’s left, they completely matched up by getting Minteh drop to mark Aït-Nouri who was positioned slightly higher than usual and Baleba tracked Reijnders when he dropped deep.
In this game, Pep decided to play Nunes as the right fullback instead of Lewis. Therefore, both fullbacks stayed outside and the wingers came inside while Silva and Rejinders often dropped deeper. It is not sure that this is the countermeasure just against Brighton’s man oriented defensive block yet.
The only way for City to break through this defensive block was that Bobb received the ball in between the lines and turned forward, then Haaland and Marmoush made forward runs to break the middle.
Indeed, their only goal against Brighton came from the combination in the middle with Bobb, Marmoush and Haaland.
This tendency of attacking through the middle can be seen more when Cherki is there. He is struggling with adjusting in the league now like Wirtz is, but his technique on the ball in tight areas can help the team to break through the opposition compact block in front of the goal.
On the other hand, the runs in behind often lack when they possess the ball against the organised defensive block. Especially when the opponents marked City players tightly rather than defending zonally, they often just drop back to receive the ball at their feet, but as the marking is tight, they cannot turn forward and just play back. This happened a lot against Brighton and they struggled to break their back line.
One of the positives would be that they regained the intention to win the ball back quickly after losing it. As the game became more open generally and City became more open as well, the transition happened more than before. Last season, they had huge problems in this area, but so far, they increased their intensity on their counterpressing. Actually, the start of the sequence of their goal against Brighton was the quick transition of Aït-Nouri who won the ball back by pressing back quickly.
Overall, their strength is breaking the lines by creating positional advantages and overloads, but as the game has become more open and most teams have shifted from zonal pressing to man oriented approach, they are facing the problems to solve. They will need to make the most of more forward options like Marmoush or Haaland and be better at the transition after losing the ball. They began to play quickly forward more often but they lost the ball a lot and failed to keep their tempo of the game, so the balance is crucial.
Out of Possession
High Pressing
Needless to say, high pressing is something they have tried to change but still struggled from last season. Generally, “high pressing” can be beneficial if you can win the ball high up the pitch and even generate goal scoring opportunities, but if you fail, you will give the opposition as dangerous opportunities as you would’ve got. So far, City have created chances for them and gifted chances for the opposition, but only the opposition turned them into goals.
Trafford gave away Spurs the second goal in the game, but in the 52nd minute of the game, City pressed high and forced Van de Ven to make a mistake inside the box, and Haaland won it back there but his last pass was just misplaced less than one meter away from Cherki. This was as clinical chace as the one Trafford gave to Spurs. Against Brighton, City kept winning the ball back in the opposition half and played many short counters, but none of them were converted into goals.
One of the most important things for them in high pressing is keeping the back line as high as possible. This creates situations like “even no shots” or “goal scoring opportunities”. If City successfully get the opposition offside, there will be no chances for them to take a shot. But if they fail, the opposition will get almost a 1v1 situation against the goalkeeper.
When Spurs scored the first goal, Stones slipped as he tried to stay the line high while dropping back to get Richarlison offside.
However, if he didn’t even try to stay the line high, he wouldn’t need to force his body to move in the opposite way, so he wouldn’t have slipped. However, keeping the line as high as possible is the heart of their pressing.
Like the illustration above, while the ball is moving, most attackers make runs in behind. However, when the ball isn’t in someone’s control, City’s defenders push the line up and keep it high to get them offside. From the first game of the season, this has been extremely organised and thanks to this, they won many offsides and restarted the game from their free kick in the middle third.
FBs Leaving the Back Line
One of their weaknesses in high pressing is the tendency of the fullbacks to leave the back line and jump to the opposition wingback or fullback. The prime example is the situation when they conceded the second goal against Brighton.
In this image, the right fullback Lewis stepped up to mark Ayari, leaving three at the back against the opposition four attackers. The ball from De Cuyper was intercepted by Stone, but Ayari played the second ball forward and Rutter laid it off, then Mitoma drifted inside to play it in behind to find Gruda who scored the goal for Brighton to win the game.
Man City’s fullbacks are willing to jump to the opposition fullback by leaving the back line, so they tend to position themselves in between the opposition fullbacks and wingers, like half and half position. This is not the problem unless they can come back to the back line quickly, but when the opposition goalkeeper or centre back plays long, they are often late to come back.
This just creates an underloaded situation at the back unnecessarily and makes it difficult to secure the second balls. So like the example above, to allow City’s fullback to leave the back line, the midfielders need to stay deep and close to the back line.
The first half against Brighton was almost perfect for City because even if the opposition played long, Bernardo Silva and Reijnders could come back deep to secure the second balls. However, the midfielders dropping deep means the gap between the midfielders and attackers can be open.
The illustration below shows how the space can be opened up by the fullbacks stepping forward.
As Aït-Nouri stepped up, the midfielders needed to cover the options in the middle because there were only three at the back. However, this created a gap between Reijnders and Haaland and Baleba successfully received the ball in open space and switched it to the left. The back line also shuffled across, so the space on the opposite side was also huge and exploitable.
As long as the fullbacks can apply pressure on the ball and close down on time, there are no problems and actually City could win the ball back a lot by the pressure from the fullbacks. So a little bit more intensity can change a lot for City. This is not like everything is bad.
Overall, out of possession, Pep is still struggling as they have conceded goals from the mistakes of pressing high. However, the high line and intensity are something hopeful and Pepijn Lijnders is there. One more step ahead.
