LM’s tactics & set up

[steviestevieneville]

For anyone who still wants to moan about NP going ( I get it) please stick to the Liam manning thread . 
His tactics have been touched on a bit , but for anyone more tactically astute than myself ( there’s plenty) I thought it might be good to try & have a positive look at his appointment & how  fans think we’ll set up with our current squad & how he could adapt / shape us going forward. 

Edited November 7, 2023 by steviestevieneville

[Harry]

Quickest way for me to respond to this is to copy my post on one of the very early pages of the very long Manning thread. See below  

There’s been some debate about his 3 or 4 at the back. He’s played both at Oxford but my feeling on this is because of personnel. I think his desire would be to play the 3 CB’s, with the outside CB’s splitting wide, 2 high wing backs, 2 CM’s in a box and a creative attacking midfielder. 
We don’t have all of those components at the moment so I wouldn’t expect him to shake anything up in his first few months. I’ll be more looking for improvements in the actual footballing ability of our players (ie being able to retain possession better in tight areas) 

Anyway - my original post below ……..

 

So, Liam Manning. 
No doubt a name many City fans aren’t very familiar with. 
Not much of a playing career which he finished early to focus on coaching. Spending 4 years with West Ham’s under 23’s during the period when Declan Rice was coming through. 
Manning’s style of play is very much focussed around a style of player such as Rice, so I have no doubt that his coaching and way of playing would have been a good influence on Rice. 
 

His first proper job as a manager was in the Belgian 2nd division with Lommel. He took them from bottom of the league to 3rd in his one season there. However, this really needs to have a caveat - he spent over £11m as well as benefiting from a number of loans from Man City as they are a partner club. 
That level of transfer spend is highly unusual in the Belgian 2nd division, so I think it’s fair to say he had a significant amount of help to get them from bottom to 3rd. 
 

He took the job at MK Dons for the 21/22 season after Russell Martin left for Swansea. 
As regular readers will know, I was very keen on City signing Scott Twine. It’s for that reason that I saw a lot of MK Dons that season as I was keen to watch as much of Twine as I could. 
They had a superb season. 89 points, finishing 3rd and losing in the playoffs (rather craply to Wycombe). 

I watched a number of their games that season and they were a joy to watch. 
I am a tad bias here, because I absolutely loved watching Twine play. 

He’d mostly set up with 3 at the back (usually Darling, O’Hora and Lewington). All 3 were encouraged to play and they enjoyed vast amounts of possession. McEacheran and Matt O’Riley were a beautifully balanced midfield and then Twine creating in behind a striker - usually Eisa. 
They were superb to watch but their passing from the back style did get them into trouble a few times. 
 

As much as they played beautiful football that season, I can’t actually put it all down to Manning. He’d inherited a team which was already set up to play that way from Russell Martin - I think Manning just carried on his good work. 
Martin had signed Fisher (the keeper), Darling, O’Hora, Harvie, McEacheran, O’Riley, Kasuma and Twine. 
Martin had basically assembled this stylish squad. 
 

He lost the keeper in January to Swansea. The keeper was the catalyst to the playing out from the back style. 
He also very crucially lost O’Riley in January to Celtic. 
I thought this would be a massive blow as O’Riley was quite simply excellent. 
Manning signed a couple of loans to replace them - A keeper from Chelsea and a midfielder from West Ham (so clearly using his contacts from his West Ham u23 days). 
Twine was outstanding for the rest of the season and they didn’t miss O’Riley as much as I thought they would. 
 

So, a beautiful football team that season but one which was assembled by the previous manager. 
 

The next season didn’t start well. Won 4, Drew 3, Lost 13!! 
He’s lost the nucleus of the team though. Darling & Twine both leaving - probably the best 2 players in the league the season before. This was always going to be a massive blow. 
He also lost Kasumu in CM, who gave a tonne of legs and energy. 
 

He replaced Darling & Twine with Jack Tucker and Conor Grant. 
2 players who I was actually quite fond of myself, but they were nowhere near the same level of quality as those he lost. 
It was always going to be a bit of a struggle but quite how they went from the most beautiful team in League 1 to losing 13 of 20 is baffling. 
 

Onto Oxford. He arrived at the back end of last season when they sat 19th and in danger of the drop. He managed to keep them up but I think that was more down to other teams being so poor. He only won 2 of 12 games but got enough draws (5) to stave off relegation. 
I watched Oxford a couple of times last season before he arrived and I thought they were awful. I wouldn’t have been surprised had they gone down. So he kept them up, but only just in reality. 
 

This season, the Oxford I see now are chalk and cheese to the Oxford I saw last year who were awful. They are now playing the good stuff that Manning had at MK (perhaps it wasn’t all down to Russ Martin after all??)

He’s made some decent signings that fit his style. 
He’s loaned in a keeper from Brighton to help him play from the back. 
He brought McEacheran with him from MK - a good ball retainer for league 1. 
He brought Rodrigues in from Notts (this is his Twine, the creative roaming attacking midfielder type). 
He brought in Greg Leigh who has been an absolute revelation at wing back. 
He’s got McGuane playing well (I wasn’t overly impressed with him the year before but Manning seems to have lit his fire). 
He’s also made another couple of loans from Prem clubs to supplement his squad.  
 

Add Cameron Brannigan to this and with a tandem of either Brannigan/Maguane or Brannigan/McEacheran and he’s got a dominant ball retaining midfield. 
I think he’s still mostly playing 3 at the back as he did at MK, but he’s played a 4 sometimes too. I think he’s mostly switched to a 3 after the arrival of Leigh at wing back, so he seems open to changing his formation to suit his players. 

I must say, the transformation of the awful Oxford team last season to the stylish and winning team of this season is a remarkable one. And there is no doubt about it that this is 100% down to Manning. 
 

I can understand why many fans will see this as a rather underwhelming choice, but he is exactly the sort of person who fits the remit of how we are wanting to play. 
But ultimately, Manning’s style of play requires the right players to be able to play it. 
He’s always favoured a keeper who can play from the back - we don’t have that. 
He likes 2 deep CM’s who can control and dominate possession - we don’t have that. 
He likes a creative AM - we don’t have that. 
He likes high wing backs - we kinda half have that. 
He likes 3 CB’s who can build from the back - we don’t really have that. Naismith yes, but the others no. 
 

So he may be the right man for the way we WANT to play, but I actually don’t believe we have the players who can fit that style. 

Edited November 7, 2023 by Harry

[RedRoss]

 

Edited November 7, 2023 by RedRoss

[W-S-M Seagull]

3 minutes ago, Harry said:

Quickest way for me to respond to this is to copy my post on one of the very early pages of the very long Manning thread. See below  

There’s been some debate about his 3 or 4 at the back. He’s played both at Oxford but my feeling on this is because of personnel. I think his desire would be to play the 3 CB’s, with the outside CB’s splitting wide, 2 high wing backs, 2 CM’s in a box and a creative attacking midfielder. 
We don’t have all of those components at the moment so I wouldn’t expect him to shake anything up in his first few months. I’ll be more looking for improvements in the actual footballing ability of our players (ie being able to retain possession better in tight areas) 

Anyway - my original post below ……..

 

So, Liam Manning. 
No doubt a name many City fans aren’t very familiar with. 
Not much of a playing career which he finished early to focus on coaching. Spending 4 years with West Ham’s under 23’s during the period when Declan Rice was coming through. 
Manning’s style of play is very much focussed around a style of player such as Rice, so I have no doubt that his coaching and way of playing would have been a good influence on Rice. 
 

His first proper job as a manager was in the Belgian 2nd division with Lommel. He took them from bottom of the league to 3rd in his one season there. However, this really needs to have a caveat - he spent over £11m as well as benefiting from a number of loans from Man City as they are a partner club. 
That level of transfer spend is highly unusual in the Belgian 2nd division, so I think it’s fair to say he had a significant amount of help to get them from bottom to 3rd. 
 

He took the job at MK Dons for the 21/22 season after Russell Martin left for Swansea. 
As regular readers will know, I was very keen on City signing Scott Twine. It’s for that reason that I saw a lot of MK Dons that season as I was keen to watch as much of Twine as I could. 
They had a superb season. 89 points, finishing 3rd and losing in the playoffs (rather craply to Wycombe). 

I watched a number of their games that season and they were a joy to watch. 
I am a tad bias here, because I absolutely loved watching Twine play. 

He’d mostly set up with 3 at the back (usually Darling, O’Hora and Lewington). All 3 were encouraged to play and they enjoyed vast amounts of possession. McEacheran and Matt O’Riley were a beautifully balanced midfield and then Twine creating in behind a striker - usually Eisa. 
They were superb to watch but their passing from the back style did get them into trouble a few times. 
 

As much as they played beautiful football that season, I can’t actually put it all down to Manning. He’d inherited a team which was already set up to play that way from Russell Martin - I think Manning just carried on his good work. 
Martin had signed Fisher (the keeper), Darling, O’Hora, Harvie, McEacheran, O’Riley, Kasuma and Twine. 
Martin had basically assembled this stylish squad. 
 

He lost the keeper in January to Swansea. The keeper was the catalyst to the playing out from the back style. 
He also very crucially lost O’Riley in January to Celtic. 
I thought this would be a massive blow as O’Riley was quite simply excellent. 
Manning signed a couple of loans to replace them - A keeper from Chelsea and a midfielder from West Ham (so clearly using his contacts from his West Ham u23 days). 
Twine was outstanding for the rest of the season and they didn’t miss O’Riley as much as I thought they would. 
 

So, a beautiful football team that season but one which was assembled by the previous manager. 
 

The next season didn’t start well. Won 4, Drew 3, Lost 13!! 
He’s lost the nucleus of the team though. Darling & Twine both leaving - probably the best 2 players in the league the season before. This was always going to be a massive blow. 
He also lost Kasumu in CM, who gave a tonne of legs and energy. 
 

He replaced Darling & Twine with Jack Tucker and Conor Grant. 
2 players who I was actually quite fond of myself, but they were nowhere near the same level of quality as those he lost. 
It was always going to be a bit of a struggle but quite how they went from the most beautiful team in League 1 to losing 13 of 20 is baffling. 
 

Onto Oxford. He arrived at the back end of last season when they sat 19th and in danger of the drop. He managed to keep them up but I think that was more down to other teams being so poor. He only won 2 of 12 games but got enough draws (5) to stave off relegation. 
I watched Oxford a couple of times last season before he arrived and I thought they were awful. I wouldn’t have been surprised had they gone down. So he kept them up, but only just in reality. 
 

This season, the Oxford I see now are chalk and cheese to the Oxford I saw last year who were awful. They are now playing the good stuff that Manning had at MK (perhaps it wasn’t all down to Russ Martin after all??)

He’s made some decent signings that fit his style. 
He’s loaned in a keeper from Brighton to help him play from the back. 
He brought McEacheran with him from MK - a good ball retainer for league 1. 
He brought Rodrigues in from Notts (this is his Twine, the creative roaming attacking midfielder type). 
He brought in Greg Leigh who has been an absolute revelation at wing back. 
He’s got McGuane playing well (I wasn’t overly impressed with him the year before but Manning seems to have lit his fire). 
He’s also made another couple of loans from Prem clubs to supplement his squad.  
 

Add Cameron Brannigan to this and with a tandem of either Brannigan/Maguane or Brannigan/McEacheran and he’s got a dominant ball retaining midfield. 
I think he’s still mostly playing 3 at the back as he did at MK, but he’s played a 4 sometimes too. I think he’s mostly switched to a 3 after the arrival of Leigh at wing back, so he seems open to changing his formation to suit his players. 

I must say, the transformation of the awful Oxford team last season to the stylish and winning team of this season is a remarkable one. And there is no doubt about it that this is 100% down to Manning. 
 

I can understand why many fans will see this as a rather underwhelming choice, but he is exactly the sort of person who fits the remit of how we are wanting to play. 
But ultimately, Manning’s style of play requires the right players to be able to play it. 
He’s always favoured a keeper who can play from the back - we don’t have that. 
He likes 2 deep CM’s who can control and dominate possession - we don’t have that. 
He likes a creative AM - we don’t have that. 
He likes high wing backs - we kinda half have that. 
He likes 3 CB’s who can build from the back - we don’t really have that. Naismith yes, but the others no. 
 

So he may be the right man for the way we WANT to play, but I actually don’t believe we have the players who can fit that style. 

I don't want him to recruit for his preferred 3 at the back. That's not what the brief was. 

What do we do then? Change how all the youth teams also play? 

He needs to stick with 433 and whatever variation of that and recruitment should be around that. 

We don't need revolution here.

If he can't do that then he's not the right appointment. 

If the board are willing to give him time and money to change things then they've lied to us.

 

[RedRoss]

16 minutes ago, W-S-M Seagull said:

I don't want him to recruit for his preferred 3 at the back. That's not what the brief was. 

What do we do then? Change how all the youth teams also play? 

He needs to stick with 433 and whatever variation of that and recruitment should be around that. 

We don't need revolution here.

If he can't do that then he's not the right appointment. 

If the board are willing to give him time and money to change things then they've lied to us.

 

What if he picks three at the back and we wins games? Still bin it yeah?

[RedM]

Now i'm a bit confused after reading a few of the above posts on here. I thought our players were set up in a system which goes from 1st team right way down through U18's etc. And any change of Manager would be seamless as players were so drilled in this style of play?

Now Manning has arrived and people say he doesn't really play the system that we have? Either we have to rip it all up and almost retrain the players or the Manager has to change? 

Also i notice a lot of comments about him loaning in players, not a thing we are really used to for a while. Again, will this block pathways of players Tinnion is trying to push to be included?

I'm all for a fresh start now, but I hope he is allowed to do his job as after all he has the experience albeit at a lower level.

[W-S-M Seagull]

2 minutes ago, RedRoss said:

What if he picks three at the back and we wins games? Still bin it yeah?

We've barely got 2 fit CBs so good luck to him if he chooses to switch to it now. 

The point I'm making that if he wants to play his preferred formation here, he'd need to spend money to do so. 

I'd rather that money was spent on enhancing the system we currently play.

[Dan11]

I guarantee that you won't have a clue what formation you are playing. It will transition between 3-4-3, 3-5-2 and 4-2-3-1 within games let alone from game to game. Get used to hearing the word 'principles'. 

[RedRoss]

14 minutes ago, RedM said:

Now i'm a bit confused after reading a few of the above posts on here. I thought our players were set up in a system which goes from 1st team right way down through U18's etc. And any change of Manager would be seamless as players were so drilled in this style of play?

Now Manning has arrived and people say he doesn't really play the system that we have? Either we have to rip it all up and almost retrain the players or the Manager has to change? 

Also i notice a lot of comments about him loaning in players, not a thing we are really used to for a while. Again, will this block pathways of players Tinnion is trying to push to be included?

I'm all for a fresh start now, but I hope he is allowed to do his job as after all he has the experience albeit at a lower level.

I think its more about principles not style of play. How would you describe our current style of play? I'd struggle to be honest, i don't think we have one. One week we dominate possession but don't do much with it. The next week we don't have possession but kill teams on the break. Other games we hit it long. I'm not critiquing Nige btw. He's had to clear out alot of deadwood to get us even to here.

As already described in his recent interview Manning is going to focus on principles. I'd describe our team as hard working, put their bodies on the line, pacey, high intensity. I'm not sure the formation ect is that difficult to train professional players on. They will have played a mixture of formations and systems at other times in their career. It's the principle element that needs to continue the other bits just need refining.

Edited November 7, 2023 by RedRoss

[ashton_fan]

NP started with 5-3-2 throughout the club and only switched to the current formation part way through last season so it shouldn't be unfamiliar to our players, once Atkinson's fit we should have enough CBs although another addition would be preferable 

[And Its Smith]

Regarding formations, the simple truth is fans are obsessed with them, a lot of managers aren’t

[steviestevieneville]

2 minutes ago, And Its Smith said:

Regarding formations, the simple truth is fans are obsessed with them, a lot of managers aren’t

That is true 

[steviestevieneville]

11 minutes ago, W-S-M Seagull said:

We've barely got 2 fit CBs so good luck to him if he chooses to switch to it now. 

The point I'm making that if he wants to play his preferred formation here, he'd need to spend money to do so. 

I'd rather that money was spent on enhancing the system we currently play.

Again , worrying about things & being way too literal in what was said by JL. 
please contribute on a tactical level on what he might do rather than derailing this thread I started get away from the doom & gloom of the other thread 

[Harry]

38 minutes ago, W-S-M Seagull said:

I don't want him to recruit for his preferred 3 at the back. That's not what the brief was. 

What do we do then? Change how all the youth teams also play? 

He needs to stick with 433 and whatever variation of that and recruitment should be around that. 

We don't need revolution here.

If he can't do that then he's not the right appointment. 

If the board are willing to give him time and money to change things then they've lied to us.

 

 

20 minutes ago, RedM said:

Now i'm a bit confused after reading a few of the above posts on here. I thought our players were set up in a system which goes from 1st team right way down through U18's etc. And any change of Manager would be seamless as players were so drilled in this style of play?

Now Manning has arrived and people say he doesn't really play the system that we have? Either we have to rip it all up and almost retrain the players or the Manager has to change? 

Also i notice a lot of comments about him loaning in players, not a thing we are really used to for a while. Again, will this block pathways of players Tinnion is trying to push to be included?

I'm all for a fresh start now, but I hope he is allowed to do his job as after all he has the experience albeit at a lower level.

I think the club quotes of “one style through the whole club” is a bit of a misnomer really. 
I think what they mean is that they want players to be able to play in a certain ‘style’, not necessarily a certain ‘formation’. 
 

The style is high intensity, high energy, with a focus on attempting to win the ball back within a certain number of passes/seconds etc etc. The formation which the manager plays doesn’t matter - the principles of high intensity etc are the ones which are “in place throughout”. 
 

Pearson mostly played 3 at the back before changing after Xmas 22. The club principles were the same.
 

But….. as you’ll see from my posts, my main concern is that some of the players we’ve recruited into this high intensity style don’t necessarily also match Manning’s desire to dominate the ball. 
I think he has certain preferences/attributes in players which we don’t currently have at the club. 
 

So yes, the principles will remain the same, but in order to achieve what the club want and what Manning needs, there will need to be better recruitment. 

Edited November 7, 2023 by Harry

[Galley is our king]

11 minutes ago, ashton_fan said:

NP started with 5-3-2 throughout the club and only switched to the current formation part way through last season so it shouldn't be unfamiliar to our players, once Atkinson's fit we should have enough CBs although another addition would be preferable 

Another addition was preferable in the summer...

[Davefevs]

18 minutes ago, RedM said:

Now i'm a bit confused after reading a few of the above posts on here. I thought our players were set up in a system which goes from 1st team right way down through U18's etc. And any change of Manager would be seamless as players were so drilled in this style of play?

Now Manning has arrived and people say he doesn't really play the system that we have? Either we have to rip it all up and almost retrain the players or the Manager has to change? 

Also i notice a lot of comments about him loaning in players, not a thing we are really used to for a while. Again, will this block pathways of players Tinnion is trying to push to be included?

I'm all for a fresh start now, but I hope he is allowed to do his job as after all he has the experience albeit at a lower level.

I think others have answered….but I’m just gonna wait and see.

8 minutes ago, ashton_fan said:

NP started with 5-3-2 throughout the club and only switched to the current formation part way through last season so it shouldn't be unfamiliar to our players, once Atkinson's fit we should have enough CBs although another addition would be preferable 

FWIW Nige played a back 4 predominantly until he lost Nathan Baker ahead of QPR in 21/22, when he switched to a back 3 (Tanner’s debut iirc).  Abd then he stuck with it in the main until last Jan (Swansea cup).

[RedRoss]

1 minute ago, Harry said:

 

I think the club quotes of “one style through the whole club” is a bit of a misnomer really. 
I think what they mean is that they want players to be able to play in a certain ‘style’, not necessarily a certain ‘formation’. 
 

The style is high intensity, high energy, with a focus on attempting to win the ball back within a certain number of passes/seconds etc etc. The formation which the manager plays doesn’t matter - the principles of high intensity etc are the ones which are “in place throughout”. 
 

Pearson mostly played 3 at the back before changing after Xmas 22. The club principles were the same.
 

But….. as you’ll see from my posts, my main concern is that some of the players we’ve recruited into this high intensity style don’t necessarily also match Manning’s desire to dominate the ball. 
I think he has certain preferences which we don’t currently have at the club. 
 

So yes, the principles will remain the same, but in order to achieve any the club want and what Manning needs, there will need to be better recruitment. 

This is also my worry. I'm not sure if we have the players to fit Mannings objective of retaining the ball.

However, can he coach that or install the confidence for the existing players to do that. It'll go one way or the other. Plus as you said we'll need to strengthen correctly in January.

[The Bard]

1 hour ago, Harry said:

Quickest way for me to respond to this is to copy my post on one of the very early pages of the very long Manning thread. See below  

There’s been some debate about his 3 or 4 at the back. He’s played both at Oxford but my feeling on this is because of personnel. I think his desire would be to play the 3 CB’s, with the outside CB’s splitting wide, 2 high wing backs, 2 CM’s in a box and a creative attacking midfielder. 
We don’t have all of those components at the moment so I wouldn’t expect him to shake anything up in his first few months. I’ll be more looking for improvements in the actual footballing ability of our players (ie being able to retain possession better in tight areas) 

Anyway - my original post below ……..

 

So, Liam Manning. 
No doubt a name many City fans aren’t very familiar with. 
Not much of a playing career which he finished early to focus on coaching. Spending 4 years with West Ham’s under 23’s during the period when Declan Rice was coming through. 
Manning’s style of play is very much focussed around a style of player such as Rice, so I have no doubt that his coaching and way of playing would have been a good influence on Rice. 
 

His first proper job as a manager was in the Belgian 2nd division with Lommel. He took them from bottom of the league to 3rd in his one season there. However, this really needs to have a caveat - he spent over £11m as well as benefiting from a number of loans from Man City as they are a partner club. 
That level of transfer spend is highly unusual in the Belgian 2nd division, so I think it’s fair to say he had a significant amount of help to get them from bottom to 3rd. 
 

He took the job at MK Dons for the 21/22 season after Russell Martin left for Swansea. 
As regular readers will know, I was very keen on City signing Scott Twine. It’s for that reason that I saw a lot of MK Dons that season as I was keen to watch as much of Twine as I could. 
They had a superb season. 89 points, finishing 3rd and losing in the playoffs (rather craply to Wycombe). 

I watched a number of their games that season and they were a joy to watch. 
I am a tad bias here, because I absolutely loved watching Twine play. 

He’d mostly set up with 3 at the back (usually Darling, O’Hora and Lewington). All 3 were encouraged to play and they enjoyed vast amounts of possession. McEacheran and Matt O’Riley were a beautifully balanced midfield and then Twine creating in behind a striker - usually Eisa. 
They were superb to watch but their passing from the back style did get them into trouble a few times. 
 

As much as they played beautiful football that season, I can’t actually put it all down to Manning. He’d inherited a team which was already set up to play that way from Russell Martin - I think Manning just carried on his good work. 
Martin had signed Fisher (the keeper), Darling, O’Hora, Harvie, McEacheran, O’Riley, Kasuma and Twine. 
Martin had basically assembled this stylish squad. 
 

He lost the keeper in January to Swansea. The keeper was the catalyst to the playing out from the back style. 
He also very crucially lost O’Riley in January to Celtic. 
I thought this would be a massive blow as O’Riley was quite simply excellent. 
Manning signed a couple of loans to replace them - A keeper from Chelsea and a midfielder from West Ham (so clearly using his contacts from his West Ham u23 days). 
Twine was outstanding for the rest of the season and they didn’t miss O’Riley as much as I thought they would. 
 

So, a beautiful football team that season but one which was assembled by the previous manager. 
 

The next season didn’t start well. Won 4, Drew 3, Lost 13!! 
He’s lost the nucleus of the team though. Darling & Twine both leaving - probably the best 2 players in the league the season before. This was always going to be a massive blow. 
He also lost Kasumu in CM, who gave a tonne of legs and energy. 
 

He replaced Darling & Twine with Jack Tucker and Conor Grant. 
2 players who I was actually quite fond of myself, but they were nowhere near the same level of quality as those he lost. 
It was always going to be a bit of a struggle but quite how they went from the most beautiful team in League 1 to losing 13 of 20 is baffling. 
 

Onto Oxford. He arrived at the back end of last season when they sat 19th and in danger of the drop. He managed to keep them up but I think that was more down to other teams being so poor. He only won 2 of 12 games but got enough draws (5) to stave off relegation. 
I watched Oxford a couple of times last season before he arrived and I thought they were awful. I wouldn’t have been surprised had they gone down. So he kept them up, but only just in reality. 
 

This season, the Oxford I see now are chalk and cheese to the Oxford I saw last year who were awful. They are now playing the good stuff that Manning had at MK (perhaps it wasn’t all down to Russ Martin after all??)

He’s made some decent signings that fit his style. 
He’s loaned in a keeper from Brighton to help him play from the back. 
He brought McEacheran with him from MK - a good ball retainer for league 1. 
He brought Rodrigues in from Notts (this is his Twine, the creative roaming attacking midfielder type). 
He brought in Greg Leigh who has been an absolute revelation at wing back. 
He’s got McGuane playing well (I wasn’t overly impressed with him the year before but Manning seems to have lit his fire). 
He’s also made another couple of loans from Prem clubs to supplement his squad.  
 

Add Cameron Brannigan to this and with a tandem of either Brannigan/Maguane or Brannigan/McEacheran and he’s got a dominant ball retaining midfield. 
I think he’s still mostly playing 3 at the back as he did at MK, but he’s played a 4 sometimes too. I think he’s mostly switched to a 3 after the arrival of Leigh at wing back, so he seems open to changing his formation to suit his players. 

I must say, the transformation of the awful Oxford team last season to the stylish and winning team of this season is a remarkable one. And there is no doubt about it that this is 100% down to Manning. 
 

I can understand why many fans will see this as a rather underwhelming choice, but he is exactly the sort of person who fits the remit of how we are wanting to play. 
But ultimately, Manning’s style of play requires the right players to be able to play it. 
He’s always favoured a keeper who can play from the back - we don’t have that. 
He likes 2 deep CM’s who can control and dominate possession - we don’t have that. 
He likes a creative AM - we don’t have that. 
He likes high wing backs - we kinda half have that. 
He likes 3 CB’s who can build from the back - we don’t really have that. Naismith yes, but the others no. 
 

So he may be the right man for the way we WANT to play, but I actually don’t believe we have the players who can fit that style. 

As sharp.and precise as your analysis is, I hope that he is pragmatic. I really do not want to see a new manager try to reinvent how we play in November. It might not be perfect but it is pretty well established and respected by the rest of the division.

 

He needs to gradually adapt our style.  I disagree about O 'Leary and will be interested how he does with a different manager. A decent understudy is needed even if it is to nudge him a little.

Agree 100% about a 10. We don't have one of these unless Benarous returns and kicks on. Likely to be a Jamuary signing. 

This leads me to my biggest concern. What is happening with fitness/ s & c?  What's happening there?

Edited November 7, 2023 by The Bard

[Harry]

1 minute ago, The Bard said:

As sharp.and precise as your analysis is, I hope that he is pragmatic. I really do not want to see a new manager try to reinvent how we play in November. It might not be perfect but it is pretty well established and respected by the rest of the division.

 

He needs to gradually adapt our style.  I disagree about O 'Leary and will be interested how he does with a different manager. A decent understudy is needed even if it is to nudge him a little.

Agree 100% about a 10. We don't have one of these unless Benarous returns and kicks on. Likely to be a Jamuary signing. Twine

This leads me to my biggest concern. What is happening with fitness/ s & c?  What's happening there?

Agreed. I think LM is an intelligent chap and I can’t see him trying to reinvent the wheel early on. 
What I do expect to see from him is the coaching philosophies being displayed in the players - ie can he get them to work on better shape and movement with the ball to improve our ball retention, can he coach the players to create opportunities with sharp incisive patterns. 
I don’t see him changing anything initially, but I’d imagine there will be lots of development of the existing players to get them to be more courageous on the ball and with improved patterns. 
 

Much as we all (most) loved Nige and the job he’s done, I know it’s been discussed plenty that we were rather one-dimensional as an attacking force - so can LM instil something different in that respect? Thats what I’m looking for initially - are we improving ….

[JP Hampton]

9 minutes ago, The Bard said:

This leads me to my biggest concern. What is happening with fitness/ s & c?  What's happening there?

What concerns do you have around fitness? No one worried before there were Suggestions fromBT and JL there was a problem. 
Did anyone notice any decline on the pitch ? I certainly didn’t. 

Edited November 7, 2023 by JP Hampton

[Davefevs]

9 minutes ago, The Bard said:

As sharp.and precise as your analysis is, I hope that he is pragmatic. I really do not want to see a new manager try to reinvent how we play in November. It might not be perfect but it is pretty well established and respected by the rest of the division.

 

He needs to gradually adapt our style.  I disagree about O 'Leary and will be interested how he does with a different manager. A decent understudy is needed even if it is to nudge him a little.

Agree 100% about a 10. We don't have one of these unless Benarous returns and kicks on. Likely to be a Jamuary signing. 

This leads me to my biggest concern. What is happening with fitness/ s & c?  What's happening there?

Worth listening to his press conference (live one) on now.  I think any one who’s listened so far, would have few worries.

He is not fixed, but has principles.

[Bris Red]

Answering @Davefevs question now 

[Clevedon Red]

As long as we win games he can play any formation he wants.

[The Bard]

7 minutes ago, JP Hampton said:

What concerns do you have around fitness? No one worried before there were Suggestions fromBT and JL there was a problem. 
Did anyone notice any decline on the pitch ? I certainly didn’t. 

My point is Rennue has gone. The well respected expert was summarily sacked with our Chairman presuming he Could criticise.

 

Is he being replaced?

[steviestevieneville]

21 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

Worth listening to his press conference (live one) on now.  I think any one who’s listened so far, would have few worries.

He is not fixed, but has principles.

Yeah. Enjoyed his press conference . He came across really well. No bullshit & definitely a bloke who knows how he want to play . Encouraging . 

[Spud21]

44 minutes ago, Harry said:

Agreed. I think LM is an intelligent chap and I can’t see him trying to reinvent the wheel early on. 
What I do expect to see from him is the coaching philosophies being displayed in the players - ie can he get them to work on better shape and movement with the ball to improve our ball retention, can he coach the players to create opportunities with sharp incisive patterns. 
I don’t see him changing anything initially, but I’d imagine there will be lots of development of the existing players to get them to be more courageous on the ball and with improved patterns. 
 

Much as we all (most) loved Nige and the job he’s done, I know it’s been discussed plenty that we were rather one-dimensional as an attacking force - so can LM instil something different in that respect? Thats what I’m looking for initially - are we improving ….

Agreed I don't expect to see much different initially except maybe that we move the ball a bit quicker, and maybe look to hold possession a touch higher. 

[Offside]

I have no knowledge of how Manning’s previous teams have set up and played.

But here are a couple of things I’m hoping City can improve on:

Ball retention - we struggle to maintain possession at times and give the ball away very cheaply, sometimes gifting the other team a scoring opportunity. 

I’d like to see us improve at running with the ball. Since Scott left we have very few players who can carry the ball. Pring can do those surging runs (less in evidence this season). Mehmeti too, but he has hardly featured. Naismith, but he usually sits deep. I can’t think of anyone else.

Closing down the huge gaps we leave  in midfield - we let opposing players run a long way with the ball. 

Being able to create pockets of space - our players often seem static when we are in possession. 

 

[JoeAman08]

1 hour ago, Harry said:

Quickest way for me to respond to this is to copy my post on one of the very early pages of the very long Manning thread. See below  

There’s been some debate about his 3 or 4 at the back. He’s played both at Oxford but my feeling on this is because of personnel. I think his desire would be to play the 3 CB’s, with the outside CB’s splitting wide, 2 high wing backs, 2 CM’s in a box and a creative attacking midfielder. 
We don’t have all of those components at the moment so I wouldn’t expect him to shake anything up in his first few months. I’ll be more looking for improvements in the actual footballing ability of our players (ie being able to retain possession better in tight areas) 

Anyway - my original post below ……..

 

So, Liam Manning. 
No doubt a name many City fans aren’t very familiar with. 
Not much of a playing career which he finished early to focus on coaching. Spending 4 years with West Ham’s under 23’s during the period when Declan Rice was coming through. 
Manning’s style of play is very much focussed around a style of player such as Rice, so I have no doubt that his coaching and way of playing would have been a good influence on Rice. 
 

His first proper job as a manager was in the Belgian 2nd division with Lommel. He took them from bottom of the league to 3rd in his one season there. However, this really needs to have a caveat - he spent over £11m as well as benefiting from a number of loans from Man City as they are a partner club. 
That level of transfer spend is highly unusual in the Belgian 2nd division, so I think it’s fair to say he had a significant amount of help to get them from bottom to 3rd. 
 

He took the job at MK Dons for the 21/22 season after Russell Martin left for Swansea. 
As regular readers will know, I was very keen on City signing Scott Twine. It’s for that reason that I saw a lot of MK Dons that season as I was keen to watch as much of Twine as I could. 
They had a superb season. 89 points, finishing 3rd and losing in the playoffs (rather craply to Wycombe). 

I watched a number of their games that season and they were a joy to watch. 
I am a tad bias here, because I absolutely loved watching Twine play. 

He’d mostly set up with 3 at the back (usually Darling, O’Hora and Lewington). All 3 were encouraged to play and they enjoyed vast amounts of possession. McEacheran and Matt O’Riley were a beautifully balanced midfield and then Twine creating in behind a striker - usually Eisa. 
They were superb to watch but their passing from the back style did get them into trouble a few times. 
 

As much as they played beautiful football that season, I can’t actually put it all down to Manning. He’d inherited a team which was already set up to play that way from Russell Martin - I think Manning just carried on his good work. 
Martin had signed Fisher (the keeper), Darling, O’Hora, Harvie, McEacheran, O’Riley, Kasuma and Twine. 
Martin had basically assembled this stylish squad. 
 

He lost the keeper in January to Swansea. The keeper was the catalyst to the playing out from the back style. 
He also very crucially lost O’Riley in January to Celtic. 
I thought this would be a massive blow as O’Riley was quite simply excellent. 
Manning signed a couple of loans to replace them - A keeper from Chelsea and a midfielder from West Ham (so clearly using his contacts from his West Ham u23 days). 
Twine was outstanding for the rest of the season and they didn’t miss O’Riley as much as I thought they would. 
 

So, a beautiful football team that season but one which was assembled by the previous manager. 
 

The next season didn’t start well. Won 4, Drew 3, Lost 13!! 
He’s lost the nucleus of the team though. Darling & Twine both leaving - probably the best 2 players in the league the season before. This was always going to be a massive blow. 
He also lost Kasumu in CM, who gave a tonne of legs and energy. 
 

He replaced Darling & Twine with Jack Tucker and Conor Grant. 
2 players who I was actually quite fond of myself, but they were nowhere near the same level of quality as those he lost. 
It was always going to be a bit of a struggle but quite how they went from the most beautiful team in League 1 to losing 13 of 20 is baffling. 
 

Onto Oxford. He arrived at the back end of last season when they sat 19th and in danger of the drop. He managed to keep them up but I think that was more down to other teams being so poor. He only won 2 of 12 games but got enough draws (5) to stave off relegation. 
I watched Oxford a couple of times last season before he arrived and I thought they were awful. I wouldn’t have been surprised had they gone down. So he kept them up, but only just in reality. 
 

This season, the Oxford I see now are chalk and cheese to the Oxford I saw last year who were awful. They are now playing the good stuff that Manning had at MK (perhaps it wasn’t all down to Russ Martin after all??)

He’s made some decent signings that fit his style. 
He’s loaned in a keeper from Brighton to help him play from the back. 
He brought McEacheran with him from MK - a good ball retainer for league 1. 
He brought Rodrigues in from Notts (this is his Twine, the creative roaming attacking midfielder type). 
He brought in Greg Leigh who has been an absolute revelation at wing back. 
He’s got McGuane playing well (I wasn’t overly impressed with him the year before but Manning seems to have lit his fire). 
He’s also made another couple of loans from Prem clubs to supplement his squad.  
 

Add Cameron Brannigan to this and with a tandem of either Brannigan/Maguane or Brannigan/McEacheran and he’s got a dominant ball retaining midfield. 
I think he’s still mostly playing 3 at the back as he did at MK, but he’s played a 4 sometimes too. I think he’s mostly switched to a 3 after the arrival of Leigh at wing back, so he seems open to changing his formation to suit his players. 

I must say, the transformation of the awful Oxford team last season to the stylish and winning team of this season is a remarkable one. And there is no doubt about it that this is 100% down to Manning. 
 

I can understand why many fans will see this as a rather underwhelming choice, but he is exactly the sort of person who fits the remit of how we are wanting to play. 
But ultimately, Manning’s style of play requires the right players to be able to play it. 
He’s always favoured a keeper who can play from the back - we don’t have that. 
He likes 2 deep CM’s who can control and dominate possession - we don’t have that. 
He likes a creative AM - we don’t have that. 
He likes high wing backs - we kinda half have that. 
He likes 3 CB’s who can build from the back - we don’t really have that. Naismith yes, but the others no. 
 

So he may be the right man for the way we WANT to play, but I actually don’t believe we have the players who can fit that style. 

You don’t think we have the cbs for 3 at the back? When fit I am not sure I am uncomfortable with any of our cbs on the ball. Not that they are mistake free but Naismith, Atkinson, Vyner, Roberts and I’d say Dickie too are all comfortable with the ball and most capable of firing passes into the feet of strikers. What would LM be looking for out of them that they don’t possess? 
 

Wingbacks I think Sykes, McRorie(played it) and Pring are decent options to get started with. Sykes and Pring bring a balance too for me. 
 

Mehmeti think shows some promise in the 10 role but we can’t rely on that. Probably our biggest need and imo was a need in the summer as well. 
 

The deep CMs it is hard to imagine Knight and Hickman not getting a look but could either play a role in the two under LM? I liked the look of McGuane. Think he could make the step up? Unimaginative for sure but maybe one he poaches? Think McRorie could end up back in there? 

[RedorDead BCFC]

1 hour ago, Harry said:

 

The style is high intensity, high energy, with a focus on attempting to win the ball back within a certain number of passes/seconds etc etc. The formation which the manager plays doesn’t matter - the principles of high intensity etc are the ones which are “in place throughout”. 
 

Wasn’t that Pep’s way when at Barca that they wanted to win the ball back in quick time. 

[Mr Popodopolous]

1 hour ago, Dan11 said:

I guarantee that you won't have a clue what formation you are playing. It will transition between 3-4-3, 3-5-2 and 4-2-3-1 within games let alone from game to game. Get used to hearing the word 'principles'. 

I can sort of get behind that to some degree.

If Naismith is fit and regularly so we could switch in game between 4-3-3 and some variation of a back 3.