I perhaps should have said the are a proper club. They have a long and respectable provenance. They may have been financially doped since then, but which European club who were successful 50 years ago (and are still around) haven’t?

There are very few I think.

Yeah, I get all of that but..

I’ll bet that nobody much had heard of them outside of the UK. Now they are a European super power. That’s the kind of comparison that I had in mind. In European terms they were a nothing club.

And add PSG to the list.

A European super power that has only won a single European trophy? That was in 1970, decades before they became financially doped.

They definitely have something about them character-wise.

Would not be surprised to see either coveted by the very best teams in europe.

Guardiola could not have failed to take notice today.

That 1970 club bears no resemblance to today's behemoth.

Wake up, start the replay, watch the smallest guy on the pitch out jump 2 central defenders, turn it off in disgust.

Haven't realized just how in form City is. Tough to get something out of this game.

I know what you mean

It’s all a bit meh

Toss a ball in the box our defenders should deal with it. Where do we go from here

That 1970 club bears no resemblance to today’s behemoth.

Sad but true

Hadn’t seen any of the Aston Villa v Leicester game until the highlights on MOTD2. Must admit I didn’t think Martinez was blameless for either Leicester goal. For the first, Maddison practically passed it into the net from quite a long distance. He certainly didn’t hit it like a Peter Lorimer thunderbolt. For Leicester’s second, Martinez parried a shot from Vardy that was more or less straight at him directly to Barnes following up, who scored. Personally I think Martinez could have done better with both.

Socrates mentioned the other day that Martinez was stronger in some aspects of his game than Leno. I can probably accept that with catching crosses. For distribution, to be honest I think the difference between them has been overstated by some. I really don’t think there’s much to choose between them, with any difference there is being pretty marginal in my view. On shot stopping, Leno gets my vote. I reckon Leno is certainly the more likely to keep a difficult shot out.

Well, after a promising last 15 mins of the 1st half in which we looked very dangerous we barely laid a glove on them in the 2nd which was disappointing because they were not at their best.

In truth, we still have too many players not at their level, either technically, physically or mentally.

Tierney and Saka were our best players which is ironic really given their relative youth and inexperience.

Hadn’t seen any of the Aston Villa v Leicester game until the highlights on MOTD2. Must admit I didn’t think Martinez was blameless for either Leicester goal. For the first, Maddison practically passed it into the net from quite a long distance. He certainly didn’t hit it like a Peter Lorimer thunderbolt. For Leicester’s second, Martinez parried a shot from Vardy that was more or less straight at him directly to Barnes following up, who scored. Personally I think Martinez could have done better with both.

Socrates mentioned the other day that Martinez was stronger in some aspects of his game than Leno. I can probably accept that with catching crosses. For distribution, to be honest I think the difference between them has been overstated by some. I really don’t think there’s much to choose between them, with any difference there is being pretty marginal in my view. On shot stopping, Leno gets my vote. I reckon Leno is certainly the more likely to keep a difficult shot out.

Shot stopping - Leno
Distribution - Martinez
Catching crosses - Martinez
Quickness in thought - Martinez

That's how I rate them. Though shot stopping is the most important aspect for a GK.

I’ll bet that nobody much had heard of them outside of the UK. Now they are a European super power. That’s the kind of comparison that I had in mind. In European terms they were a nothing club.

And add PSG to the list.

Haven't realized just how in form City is.

It’s dire. A good effort but for what

The results are *%^@ but how can you improve this

A massive amount of money is the only thing that fixes this

I think a frustrating aspect of yesterday's game is that bar a 15 min period just before halftime we never really had a go at them. Which is all the more annoying because we actually looked fairly dangerous and opened them up a bit during that time, especially down the left.

I still feel that Arteta's substitutions are often too conservative and too late.

If we'd stuck with Wenger for the last 2.5 years I think we would have got more points than we have,

I think Arteta and Edu are on the right track. They've managed to clear out a whole host of underperforming, overpaid players (Özil, Mustafi etc), have bought in players who seem promising (Partey, Gabriel) and given chances to younger players (Saka, Emile Smith Rowe).

I really don't understand why fans are on Arteta's back considering the mess the club was in when Wenger left (which was then somehow made worse by Sanelhi). We could have hired Gaurdiola and there wouldn't have been a miraculous return to the top of the table. This is a 5 year+ project and anyone that thinks otherwise is unrealistic.

When I look at the two teams they are clearly better all over the pitch, but some of our players could be considered 'close' to theirs. The huge gaps in quality were:
Dias, an absolute colossus in defence, probably my player of the year along with Bruno at Man U. He dominates every situation

They've definitely stepped up defensively to a point where they're incredibly difficult to even create chances against. Liverpool have shown that you can compete with City even without huge investment from your owner, but the figures City have spent are really crazy. These are the centre backs they've bought in the last seven years (transfer fees from wikipedia, so they should at least be close to the real sum):

Dias 61m
Ake 41m
Laporte 57m
Stones 47m
Otamendi 32m
Mangala 42m

I mean, we talk about how Mustafi didn't live up to expectations and was an expensive flop - City sign a Mustafi pretty much every year. And more importantly, signing these expensive centre backs have no impact on their ability to strengthen other areas. During these years they've also spent huge amounts on the likes of De Bruyne, Sterling, Mahrez, Bernardo Silva, Cancelo, Rodri, Walker etc. It's not just a different league, they're operating on a completely different planet.

I think throwing silly money at what we think our problems are would be a recipe for disaster. Careful building, with the occasional big money buy, is the way to go. Success is not impossible with that model, and if it does come (as it did for Liverpool) it is vastly more satisfying.

I’m not sure mate. We were in free fall.

When Wenger resigned I said on here it would take years to undo the damage and decline that had set in and that the task would span more than 1 manager. I was proved right and really don’t see much changing from that. I think Ben summed it up right earlier when he said were into a 5 year project. It’s a complete rebuild and the club have made absolutely crazy decisions off the field. Sanelhi mslintat etc etc there’s no structure there and it must really hurt us.

You are right. Man United and Chelsea also have the luxury of making expensive mistakes in the transfer market.

I think throwing silly money at what we think our problems are would be a recipe for disaster. Careful building, with the occasional big money buy, is the way to go. Success is not impossible with that model, and if it does come (as it did for Liverpool) it is vastly more satisfying.

One of the most important lessons to learn from Liverpool is the importance of success in the transfer market. Since Klopp arrived, these are the players that have cost them more than 20m:

Thiago
Diogo Jota
Alisson
Keita
Fabinho
Van Dijk
Salah
Oxlade-Chamberlain
Mané
Wijnaldum

Out of those 10 signings, I would say only two (Keita and Ox) have been bad buys, while the others are somewhere in the range of good to incredible signings. Getting 8/10 big signings in a five year period right is incredible accuracy, and if we could emulate that I have no doubt we could challenge for trophies as well.

I would add Thiago in as a failure currently. He's been very ordinary and has upset the balance of the team.
To sustain that level of hit rate on transfers is very difficult, Tsimikas and Minimino don't look anywhere near the level of those they're trying to replace. The two new CB Kabak and Davies - jury is well and truly out.

If we'd stuck with Wenger for the last 2.5 years I think we would have got more points than we have, but I also think results would have still regressed just at a slower rate than they have under Emery and Arteta. I also don't think we'd have seen any green shoots of recovery that we have seen under Arteta.
With Wenger it was 1 step back every season. By getting rid of him we probably took two steps back every season BUT we gave ourselves the opportunity in the longer term to take 2 steps forward every season after the slide was arrested, I didn't see any way Wenger was going to take us a step forward whilst he stayed with us.

I can't agree about Thiago - he's looked pretty ordinary by his standards, but the balance of the team is more likely upset by not having central defenders available for most of the season and having to shuffle around their midfield from game to game. Play Thiago with Henderson or Wijnaldum with Fabinho in his role as the midfield pivot and I think we would see a much different player.

I do agree it's hard to sustain their level of transfer success though, but their big buys still seem good to me. The likes of Minamino, Tsimikas, Davies and Kabak are all cheap transfers or loans, you can always gamble a little bit more with those. Their next big task will be to replace Wijnaldum, who I think is very underrated and has been an important player for Klopps style of football.