What a season it has been for Manchester City! Through ups and downs, mostly ups in the domestic league of course; a few records shattered and a few possibly to be shattered and a great many amount of goals scored, they have finally won the title with 5 games left. First thing that I want to say is- This City team will go down as one of the best sides in the Premier League era. City management waited a bit too long to land Pep Guardiola and they are seeing the efforts pay off.

The fact that this team is to be included as one of the best in the PL era is not just because of sheer numbers they have produced over the course of the season. It is because of the fact that the flair they have shown and the way they have played is unparalleled, even for the players themselves. A proper number 10, Kevin De Bruyne and a winger Silva converted to interiors; Centre Backs and Goalkeepers asked to play the ball short in the build ups, a rare sight in English league; Agüero playing in a much different role than of a classic number 9…. This City had it all.

England has always been skeptical about Pep Guardiola’s methods. “It won’t work in England you know, here it is a lot of friction and long balls. He will have to change his idealistic approach if he wants to succeed here.” Well, he didn’t, and he was proven right by his squad. The English have always failed to deal with the abstract. It is always met with a sense of anti-intellectualism. Orthodoxy and naivety have for a long time plagued the game in England.

And that is the reason Englishmen like Jimmy Hogan, Herbert Chapman, Vic Buckingham stand out. These men reimagined the game. Jimmy Hogan’s work paved way for Austrian Wunderteam and the Mighty Magyars. Herbert Chapman questioned the conventional 2-3-5 and it was the onset of the WM. His so called WM however, became the new orthodoxy till Sir Alf Ramsey’s England side played a highly functional football, which later boiled down to plain functionality and pragmatism in the game.

On this background it is for everyone to see what Pep has achieved playing HIS way and sticking to his ideals.

The team this season has seen a massive upgrade in terms of both football and results over the last season. The game against Chelsea in December 2016 exemplified City’s last season. They were commanding, leading in fact most of the game only to waste a few opportunities in front of the goal and ultimately succumb to counters.

This season however, the team seems to understand and respond well to Pep’s plans. Pep’s spending has been a subject of constant criticism. However, in doing so most of the pundits and journalists have ignored the fact that when you sign Guardiola, you have to be sure about what you will get in return. To create a winning team, playing his way, he asks for players to be comfortable on the ball. He had such players at Barcelona thanks to La Masia. He doesn’t have the luxury of such an academy at City. So the spending spree doesn’t really prove anything apart from the fact that he was astute in identifying his transfer targets and it paid off. The cost is determined by the market. Not the manager.

John Stones and Nicolas Otamendi were criticized for being error-prone. However, the two repaid Pep’s confidence in full. Kompany was solid throughout the season. With the strong and quick rightback in Walker and Mendy/Delph on the left, the team saw massive upgrade over last season’s team as the intelligent fullbacks are vital to this system. This time, Pep was able to either invert his full backs to stop counters and help achieve superiority in the centre as seen against Napoli or push his wingbacks up the field to pin the opposition full backs as seen against Chelsea, or even have one full back pushing forward while other maintaining three men behind the ball, as and when required. A full back acting as a false midfielder has always been a signature for a Pep team, it supports the midfield after all. That’s what you have to look for in his team. Superiority- Numerical, Positional and Qualitative.

One of the most interesting feature has been comparatively an even distribution of goals and assists among the front 5 of Agüero/Jesus, Sterling, De Bruyne, Sané and Silva. Sterling is finally looking much more confident than ever as he keeps getting in good positions. Sané, Agüero and Jesus perfectly executed their responsibilities OFF the ball for most of the season while Silva and KDB, the creative outlets were phenomenal. Kevin De Bruyne has been sensational. He has found angles with his passes which only a few players can boast. You can’t teach a player to spot passing opportunities and execute them with perfect weightage on the pass. It comes naturally. These kind of opportunities are to be spotted and exploited in that moment itself. If the player decides to move the ball around instead and play safe, the opportunity is lost. It is the manager who has to show faith in the player and encourage him to take those opportunities even if there is some chance of losing the ball, and a creative pivot himself in his playing time, Pep knows. “Failed? Ok. Try again. Who knows, one pass from the attempted four might end up in the right place at the right time and dismantle the opponents…”

Another subject of criticism has been Pep’s record in the Champions League in his post-Barcelona days. This criticism is part justified, however an interesting stat to look at would be the fact that of the seven teams to have ousted him from UCL, only 3 teams- Inter of 2009-10, Barcelona of 2014-15 and Monaco of 2016-17 have managed to win the domestic title, while only Inter and Barcelona ALSO won the Champions League. The domestic league and the Champions League have different considerations. The league goes on for a larger period but without knockouts and should still be the primary objective, while Champions League has lesser number of matches per team but with knockout phases. There are several factors- fitness, mental fatigue, the condition of the opponent, the tournaments you play in other than CL and perhaps even Luck! Maybe winning has been a habit for Pep in domestic competitions and it is thus assumed for him to perform at highest level in CL.

However, as Guardiola believes in being proactive, there are a few things that have held City back or can see an improvement. As we said, no player of this team has come from Masia unlike his Barça side. So it is quite understandable that this team do not have a background of thousands of hours of training in Positional Play (mind you it’s Positional Play and not annoying Tiki-Taka). It is totally different for the players. City team thus still kept losing that ball a bit casually over the course of the season and were a bit hesitant in their approach against Liverpool’s incessant pressing. That’s where the team can improve a lot. Also the mental condition. In my opinion, Liverpool’s pressing was intimidating for any team in the world. The key would still be to remain patient and execute the gameplan to perfection with least (practically zero) amount of mistakes. And it requires great amount of confidence and concentration.

Towards the later stages of the season, City’s build up became a bit too predictable. Only Liverpool however were able to take its advantage in full. With Fernandinho dropping deep, De Bruyne and Silva still played considerably ahead. Thus the team either had to pass the ball backwards or out wide without being able to penetrate through the centre. This led the team to succumb against the relentless pressing and central block by Liverpool. This might be due to the lack of patience and Pep might want to work on that.

In all however, this season has been spectacular. This is a brand of football the Citizens have never seen and will remember for a long time. For me, the game has just started for Pep. He would be eager to achieve more success in coming year. I see him at City for one more season after the one coming up. And if he succeeds in satisfying all the expectations, the life after Pep is going to be difficult without a proper replacement.