[ESP-ENG] UN GIGANTE CAÍDO / A FALLEN GIANT By Titopx

Let's talk about the team that in the last 7 championships has won the trophy 6 times, being currently the champion for the 4th consecutive time.

Pep Guardiola's Manchester City, who used to be a feared and respected team in England that you have to suffer to get points when they face them, is currently in 7TH POSITION outside the European competition.

Despite starting as we were used to years ago with a fearsome offense and consistency in their game plan, when November started a remarkable negative streak, since the beginning of that month they had 9 games in Premier League _{(Let's not forget that their bad streak also took them to other tournaments)} in which of the 27 points in dispute they could only get 5 of them harvesting only 1 win and 2 draws.

All this obviously had to have repercussions in the team's universe where the media have been in charge of worsening the situation and the coach's desperation is noticeable in interviews and press conferences.

I have heard incredible comments from desperate fans who mention that the main reason is the players' displeasure with the coach and that they are having bad games with the intention of getting him fired, which of course is hard to believe after these glorious years with his leadership.

Rather I think it may be due to the lack of a very important character in his scheme but that until now had not been felt so much, I am talking about the captain and Golden Ball “Rodri” who suffered one of the worst injuries that a soccer player can suffer and that will keep him away from the field for the entire season.

Although his bad streak does not coincide with the date of the injury of the Spaniard, I believe that it can have an influence on it, in addition to two other important injuries that this time do coincide with the date of the bad streak.

We are talking about the pair of defenders Jhon Stones and Ruben Dias who were being regular and decisive at the beginning of the season and who have not stopped getting injured since then, playing very few games and even at the time of writing this post both remain injured.

We should not deny that the citizen squad has enough to replace these players we mentioned, but I must say that a recurring approach may not have an effect when we remove immovable pieces in it.

To cut a long story short as I was already getting inspired on the subject, I think City's situation is more down to the current mentality and a bit of bad luck as well.

We can't let injuries to players vital to the team's style of play go under the table, but when you look at recent results and the attitudes of some players on the pitch you can tell something is going on in their minds.

The team does not press, they do not advance lines when they should, they do not attack the space or try to guess offensive intentions, add to this that your main striker _Erling Haaland _ cannot score even with penalties and is influenced by mind games proposed by the goalkeepers. _{(See the save of the penalty that Pickford made in the style of Dibu Martinez this last game.)}

Every drop of water fills the glass and the time will come when it will overflow if they don't put their thoughts aside and concentrate on getting back to being the feared team in Europe that they have been.

I firmly believe that this coming year could be good for them, maybe with some market movement in January that could solve this mentality problem, even if it means giving competition to players who have been performing a bit poorly in recent times.

Manchester City will be back and we will all be here to see it.