Manchester City show shades of seasons past in Stoke City draw

Manchester City slumped to a 0-0 draw with Stoke City on Wednesday. It was Pep Guardiola’s team on the pitch, but it looked like it could have been another City manager’s from seasons past.

Any hopes Manchester City had of chasing down Chelsea have now gone. Pep Guardiola’s men played Stoke City on Wednesday, but could only muster a 0-0 draw for the home fans inside the Etihad Stadium.

City have been in fantastic form recently, and were expected to continue that against Mark Hughes’ Stoke. That did not happen, though. Not in terms of the result, and certainly not in terms of the performance.

The performance was nowhere near the level of recent displays by City. Guardiola chose to rest the likes of Raheem Sterling, David Silva and John Stones. Probably expecting to win, and with the games coming thick and fast, trying to get in some much-needed rest, too.

But there’s no resting in the Premier League. Every game is competitive. Very rarely does a team just roll over and gift you a victory. In order to win, you have to perform. City did not perform against Stoke.

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Not only did the home team not look like the swashbuckling outfit of recent weeks, but they did look like the overly confident and overly comfortable team of recent campaigns. That blasé attitude where everything is just expected to come together at some point.

Everybody is looking around at each other, expecting someone else to produce a piece of magic. Some days it comes off, some days it doesn’t. That’s really not the issue. The issue is City still going into certain games with that mentality.

It was that mindset that saw the team finish much lower than they should have in almost every season since their last title win. Guardiola is supposed to be bringing that hunger and energy back to the team. Not field this lethargic outfit.

Clearly, though, it’s going to take time. Guardiola still has a lot of players in his squad that have been at City for years now. Cruising through many games for years now. It’s in their blood at this point.

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The game against Stoke proved that. Guardiola still needs to make changes to the team for quality purposes – in defense especially. But the Spaniard also needs to make changes for mentality purposes.

Guardiola’s City may be slowly coming to fruition, but the squad’s mindset still exhibits shades of seasons past. The 0-0 draw with Stoke highlighted as much perfectly.

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