Insufficient, must do much better. Manchester City will not get by without a passing exam for this first test of the 2023 session, which is supposed to finally lead to the long-awaited C1 diploma. This sharing in Leipzig might still allow Pep Guardiola to be able to move on to the next event by winning on March 14 at home, but they will have to reach a whole new level to hope to go even further.
Blow for Manchester City: De Bruyne will be absent for the Champions League match once morest Leipzig!
In reality, the performance of the Citizens depended on that of Leipzig, which lived two diametrically opposed halves. As if petrified by the scale of the event, Marco Rose’s side seemed to have lost the very essence of their game in the first half, with in particular a totally disorganized counter-pressing and a lack of energy.
Quite apathetic, the Germans instead spent their time watching the English play ball by plugging the holes as much as possible. But Manchester City did not necessarily benefit from it. The recurring problems of recent weeks around Erling Haaland have not been resolved. Isolated in the middle of the opposing defence, the Norwegian has only too rarely been put in a favorable position.
The City striker paradoxically also suffered the large domination of his team’s leather (75%). The balloons mostly transited laterally, at a fairly slow pace, while waiting to be able to break through the German lines. It also took a big loss of the ball from Schlager for Grealish to finally bring verticality, in the axis, and for Mahrez to open the scoring (27th: 0-1).
And when Leipzig fully pulled themselves together in the second half, City were unable to make a difference once more. The awakening of the Germans indeed coincided with a clear drop in intensity of the Citizens who had to rely on their defense and their goalkeeper several times, before finally giving in on a header from Gvardiol (70th: 1-1) .
In difficulty in the Premier League, the Sky Blues return to Manchester with even more doubts. Guardiola (who made no changes!) will quickly have to make the necessary corrections to restart his machine. And that might go through a return to form from Kevin De Bruyne (absent due to illness), whose inspirations, verticality and search for depth has clearly been lacking in his team. And especially in Haaland..
