Online Reporter
MANCHESTER CITY came from behind to beat Bournemouth 2-1 and seal an FA Cup semi-final spot.
Goals from Erling Haaland and Omar Marmoush sealed another appearance at Wembley for Pep Guardiola’s men.
The Man City gaffer unleashed some amazing tactical decisions that brought the best out of several stars. In the latest episode of SunSport’s Tactics Exposed, our expert DEAN SCOGGINS explains what City did to make the final four once more…
LIFE O’REILLY
We shouldn’t forget Nico O’Reilly is a Number 10. So to bring him on and play him at left-back was a bold thing from Pep – but it was for a variety of reasons.
One was that Abdukodir Khusanov had been booked in the first half so he was the obvious one to take off.
The second is it put Ruben Dias on his natural right-hand side and meant Gvardiol came in as the left centre-back.
It meant Nunes on the right and O’Reilly on the left like wing-backs, with Kovacic dropping in the gap.
It took away some of O’Reilly’s defensive responsibilities and became like a 3-4-2-1. It really confused Bournemouth.
He’s got a great touch and went charging up the left, with most of those touches in the attacking half.
PRESSURE MAKES DIAMONDS
City created a diamond in midfield. Kovacic dropped back between the two centre-backs.
You then bring two people in very narrow, which combats Bournemouth because they press you really narrow. What City did was get De Bruyne to go on Cook, who was the full-back, and bring him into the middle of the field.
Gundogan does the same, bringing the midfield in, and that left O’Reilly with all that space up the left-hand side.
OMAR GOD
We don’t know how long Haaland will be out after he suffered an ankle injury but what a replacement to have.
I want to focus on Marmoush’s run for his goal, it’s absolutely amazing. O’Reilly plays a high-quality pass.
But Marmoush goes the opposite way to where you’d expect him to go. As a defender, they had no idea which one of the two was going to pick him up — and nobody did.
Marmoush went backwards, which opened up this big space and nobody went with him. And the finish was good too.
Those little darting runs he makes around the edge of the area, he’s so dangerous.
THE LONG HAAL
City played it long, and it was slightly different to what I thought. It was Ederson into Haaland, but they did it cleverly because he should have had a first-half hat-trick.
City went over Bournemouth’s midfield early on and it worked really well.
They split the centre-backs on the edge of the box, Ederson gave it to one then received it and went long.
So it wasn’t long straight away, it was like a one-two. Pep also told Haaland to not stay central and create an angle for Ederson.
It also creates space for others joining in for the second ball. It was very direct and Haaland got a lot of joy. — Sun.
