Match date: 3 October 2020

The build up to the match was very much about the respect that Guardiola and Bielsa have for one another. Bielsa talked about how so many teams setup themselves up to not be beaten by Guardiola’s teams, but the Argentine was not going to set his team up in a defensive manner, instead he looked to have Leeds go at City just as they did against Liverpool.

With Fernandinho on the bench, City were in much more a 4-3-3, instead of a double pivot, with Mahrez playing as the centre forward. Leeds setup similarly, with Alioski getting his first start of the season in what was more of a 4-1-4-1.

City’s Early Dominance

For about the first 25 minutes or so of the match, Manchester City were well on top of the game. Sterling scored, De Bruyne hit the post, and City had a host of other chances that were dealt with. A lot of their early dominance was because of their setup and its relation to Leeds’ man-marking.

Throughout the match, Leeds’ man-marked the City players: Ayling stuck to Sterling, Dallas marked Torres, and the midfield three were tight to their respective City player throughout. Klich marked De Bruyne, Roberts was tasked with Rodri, and Phillips was tight to Foden.

There were a few issues here for Leeds though. The first being that, while the midfield was man-marked, it meant that Bamford had to deal with both Laporte and Dias. During City’s early period of dominance, Laporte was able to drive into midfield numerous times which destablised the Leeds pressing and man-marking, but while these runs caused Leeds some issues in their organisation, City were never able to create advantageous situations as a result of them and Laporte’s passes after dribbling forward were often backwards to Rodri or Dias.

Further up the pitch, though, is where Leeds man-marking made it difficult for them. Mahrez was deployed as the centre forward in City’s 4-3-3, but as many non-traditional centre forwards do when they play in that position, the Algerian international dropped into midfield. This of course gave City a numerical advantage in midfield. Koch and Cooper were both hesitant and/or late to track Mahrez’s movement and so at times he wasn’t picked up by anyone and was the free player for City to get on the ball. With zonal defending, this could have meant that Phillips would have picked up Mahrez, but with Leeds’ midfield man-marking, it meant that Foden was able to drag Leeds’ deepest midfielder out of position and open up that space for Mahrez. While it meant that City were able to have more of the ball and find Mahrez, it also meant that he was picking up the ball much deeper and, despite City’s dominance early on and Mahrez being the central attacking player, he had zero shots in the first half.

On the other side of the ball, City’s pressing was decent, denying Leeds the ability to establish any sort of build up. Sterling and Torres were responsible for Koch and Cooper, while creating a shadow cover on their respective full back with their closing down, while Mahrez screened Phillips.

In the above, you can see Mahrez going to close down Meslier to try to force the goalkeeper to play longer, which Meslier did on this occasion, but just a few minutes before, Mahrez waited for a ball back to Meslier, pressed him, and then the goalkeeper tried to play a pass into Phillips, but Mahrez’s press was likely a trigger for De Bruyne to go press Phillips because he caught out the Leeds midfielder (and did so a few times), allowing City to attack. De Bruyne and Foden were also ready to close down Alying and Dallas when Meslier clipped the ball over Sterling and Torres.

Leeds Grow Into The Game

A shaky start for Leeds, but after about 20 minutes, the newly promoted side started to build their own attacks. Klich started to drop a bit deeper in Leeds’ build up and Phillips was freeing himself up more in midfield and was able to move around Mahrez’s cover shadow to get on the ball and while he still wasn’t progressing the ball too much on his own, with City’s midfield three a bit flatter without the ball to allow De Bruyne and Foden to go press the Leeds’ full backs if necessary, it meant that Rodri had to step out and press Phillips. When Rodri did this, it allowed Leeds to play a bit more direct, which they embraced by getting numbers forward.

Both of Leeds’ best chances in the first half came from an initial longer ball from Cooper. The first was a ball from Cooper into Klich and although it was a bit fortunate, the Polish midfielder was able to de-mark from De Bruyne, pick up the ball, and dribble toward the City back line before squaring the ball to Bamford who laid it off to Roberts. Dallas made a run into the box with Roberts flicking it into him and Ederson was forced into a save. The next opportunity came from a ball from Cooper into the City penalty area where Mendy didn’t deal with it and Ayling was able to take advantage of the Frenchman’s mistake only to have Ederson save his effort as well.

Leeds’ Changes

To go along with their more direct play, Bielsa subbed off Alioski for Poveda-Ocampo at half time. The young winger played on the right of Leed’s attack with Helder Costa moving to the left. Poveda was direct when he got on the ball, putting Mendy under a lot of pressure, who was already booked at the time. Right as the half started, Poveda was able to pick up the ball, beat Sterling and put a low cross into Bamford as Mendy was in front of him only for Bamford’s effort to be blocked by Dias.

Again, Leeds’ were happy to either play longer balls behind City’s midfield and look to pick up the second balls or play out wide to Poveda and Costa to try to beat their respective full backs and Leeds’ next best opportunity came from the former after Rodrigo was brought on for Roberts. This time it was Koch who played a ball up to Bamford with the second ball picked up by Costa. From here, Leeds were able to combine and get Rodrigo isolated in a 1v1 situation with Dias inside the City area only for his shot to take a deflection of Dias and onto the crossbar and it was from the resulting corner kick that Ederson dropped the ball and Rodrigo tapped in.

Rodrigo was very lively playing off of Bamford and found pockets of space away from Rodri throughout the second half. With another notable example being his free header in the box from an Ayling cross that Ederson was able to top onto the crossbar.

It would be disingenuous to say that Leeds relied on second balls during the second half, however. They won the ball back extremely well and looked to get around City’s press by using their full backs, who were free to receive the ball because of the positions taken up by Sterling and Torres, and then looked to combine with Poveda and Costa in the wide areas to look to create their chances. As mentioned, Rodrigo was able to drift around the field to create numbers up situations in the wide areas as well.

City’s Responses

Guardiola’s first change was to bring on Bernardo Silva for Torres. With his introduction, Foden moved to the left, Mahrez moved to the right, and Sterling moved centrally. This almost paid off quickly as Mahrez put Sterling in on goal, but Cooper was able to delay Sterling enough before Meslier dealt with the ball.

With Leeds’ higher line in the second half due to their having more possession of the ball, it made sense to have Sterling play centrally for these exact situations. City were countering much more and if they were able to play through Leeds’ press quickly (as they did in the above situation), it would allow Sterling to run into space.

From here though, Guardiola’s changes were a bit more reactive to Leeds’ second half performance than a proactive approach to win the game. Ake was brought on for Mendy with the Frenchman on a yellow card and with the game becoming more end-to-end, it made sense to remove a player that could have potentially been sent off and wasn’t really adding to City’s build up or attacking play. Fernandinho was brought on soon after for Mahrez with City moving to a 4-2-3-1 with De Bruyne behind Sterling. City did start to see more of the ball at this point as Fernandinho was able to stop some of Leeds’ transitions, but it also meant that Sterling no longer had space to run into.

Looking Forward

At the end of the match, there was a close up on Bielsa crouching in his technical area and he looked to be reflecting on the match. Moments later Guardiola came over and Bielsa asked what Guardiola thought of the game with the Catalan replying that it ‘was a fair result’ to which Bielsa asked, ‘are you sure?’ Guardiola affirmed his thoughts as the two hugged a sign of respect between the two, not only in the ideals that they share, but with the application of them in the 90+ minutes that their teams just played.

Bielsa commented that there were ‘no tactical aspects which were significant,’ but his man-marking in City’s midfield was able to alter City’s play and City’s press made it difficult for Leeds to play into Phillips, but the openness of the game, perhaps because of all this, was the defining aspect of the game.