Tonight's FA Cup game was very different from the League game just 12 days ago. Then, City were outdone tactically and physically. Tonight, there was only one team in it. For me the major difference was in midfield. While it helped being able to play a midfielder (Garcia) instead of a defender (Demichelis) in central midfield, I think the selections of Jovetic and Milner was also pivotal. In the league game, Navas and Negredo played. Both of these are excellent players but they don't do a lot to help in the centre of midfield. That's fine when we are winning the battle there, but in the League game we didn't. Milner does more work defensively than Navas, and Jovetic plays a deeper role than Negredo, meaning City had more bodies to help in the midfield battle. This meant City dominated the game.
As well as progressing to the next round, it was good to see Jovetic finally showing us what he can do. I thought he, Silva, Toure and Milner were all excellent. Hopefully, the lessons from the two games against Chelsea will be listened to when preparations for the Barcelona game are made.
Showing posts with label FA Cup. Show all posts
Showing posts with label FA Cup. Show all posts
Saturday, 15 February 2014
Sunday, 26 January 2014
ITV's FA Cup 'highlights', or little more than the goals
Last nights FA Cup highlights show on ITV annoyed me. City were first game up yet the highlights were brief. The game of the day had little more than 5 minutes action. ITV again showed how poorly they cover football.
I can understand their (and BT Sports) decision to pick other games for live coverage. Picking FA Cup games s notoriously difficult. The 'magic' of the cup means you're never sure where the story will be. Though the TV companies don't always help themselves by, for example, always picking Man United no matter who they play. But a highlights show should be able to react to the days events and concentrate on the days stories. This is something Match of the Day does every week, showing more of the bigger stories of the day.
But even though ITV put City's game on first they also didn't help themselves by spending almost as long after the game on interviews and so-called analysis. In total they spent 5 minutes and 9 seconds showing action from the game, and 4 minutes and 13 seconds showing people talking about it. The result is that apart from the goals I got no impression of how dominant Watford reportedly were in the first half, of how poor City were in the first nor how good they were in the second half. I only saw the goals and a couple of other chances.
I can understand their (and BT Sports) decision to pick other games for live coverage. Picking FA Cup games s notoriously difficult. The 'magic' of the cup means you're never sure where the story will be. Though the TV companies don't always help themselves by, for example, always picking Man United no matter who they play. But a highlights show should be able to react to the days events and concentrate on the days stories. This is something Match of the Day does every week, showing more of the bigger stories of the day.
But even though ITV put City's game on first they also didn't help themselves by spending almost as long after the game on interviews and so-called analysis. In total they spent 5 minutes and 9 seconds showing action from the game, and 4 minutes and 13 seconds showing people talking about it. The result is that apart from the goals I got no impression of how dominant Watford reportedly were in the first half, of how poor City were in the first nor how good they were in the second half. I only saw the goals and a couple of other chances.
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