Manchester City had a disappointing return to Premier League football today as they succumbed to a 2-0 defeat at the hands of Tottenham Hotspur.
City did well to get a draw against Liverpool last time around and would have naturally thought of going one better at Spurs, but that was not the case as Jose Mourinho’s men produced a clinical display that has left Guardiola’s men now sitting in 11th place. It appears the mind games that Mourinho played coming into this one might have worked.
One of the main problems for City this season has been the lack of goals scored. In the eight league games they have played so far, they have managed to score only ten goals. The manager acknowledged this and told the Manchester Evening News how the absence of their strikers has played a part in their poor run of form in front of goal.
The Catalonian feels that they are creating abundant chances and he’s confident that the goals will ultimately come. According to Manchester Evening News, he said:
“We had a long period without strikers but can’t expect they will solve all our problems. We create chances, we have counter attacks without the last pass. We’re going to change, something is going to break in games.
“The team is going to score goals. We create with 10 players behind [the ball], we create enough chances, they had two chances and two goals, we cannot score with 22 shots, much less on target, that’s the thing you need to try to do, to shoot on target and see what happens.”
Scoring goals has not really been a problem for this City team ever since the arrival of Pep, but this season they just have not been able to fire like we have seen them do. This lack of goals has now pushed their goal difference into the minus territory.
Manchester City have been faring much better in the Champions League this season and they have another fixture in that competition on Wednesday. A win over Olympiacos will virtually guarantee them a spot in the knockout stages.
Guardiola will want a response from his players in the League as well though. If they are to get anywhere near the top of the table, they will have to start scoring soon.