Manuel Pellegrini says Manchester City job is safe regardless of Roma result
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Version 0 of 1. A night in Rome may prove the defining moment of Manuel Pellegrini’s Manchester City career. The demand from the club’s owners is material progress in the Champions League. This means that after Pellegrini took the Sheikh Mansour project into the last 16 for the first time last season, the quarter-finals are this term’s target. City’s quest to be in the competition when the knockout stage starts in February should not have been as difficult as Pellegrini has contrived. Yet on Wednesday evening his team must beat Roma at the Stadio Olimpico and hope CSKA Moscow do not defeat Bayern Munich in Bavaria. Asked if the match was going to be decisive for his future at the club, Pellegrini said: “No, I don’t think so. It’s an important game and we all want to qualify but I don’t think what happens will have any link to my future. I never received any kind of pressure from the club. I think we will qualify but it has nothing to do with my future here.” The vagaries of football make reading the runes of any manager’s future an imprecise science. Especially when the side Pellegrini made Premier League champions – and claimed the Capital One Cup with – in his inaugural campaign have just won five consecutive league games to force them back into the title race. Yet Roberto Mancini put himself under immense and what proved fatal pressure when his City team were knocked out at the group stage of the competition in their 2012-13 season as the defending domestic champions. The charge against Pellegrini is that he is tactically one-dimensional. To enter the final Group E match with a solitary victory and five points when Roma and CSKA are the competitors for second place – Bayern Munich have won the group – is evidence of the straightjacket that can constrict his team. Gung-ho may seem an odd approach for a man of sober and taciturn nature. Yet this is how his side play, with Pellegrini insisting attacking is the only way City can prosper. Of the challenge against Roma he said: “We always try to win every game and be an attacking team. We are not going to change just because it is, as you say, a knockout game. We will try to play the way we do in every game.” Pellegrini must show he has the acumen to plot a route through for City. It will not be easy. Rudi García’s team are second in Serie A and gained a credible draw in September’s encounter at the Etihad Stadium when Pellegrini’s strategy proved stodgy, and his midfield and defence too open. City’s vulnerability was exploited by Francesco Totti, who sprinted into space to equalise on an evening when Roma might have claimed all three points. That display was a microcosm of City’s early-season struggles. When sides go at Pellegrini’s men with pace and invention the Vincent Kompany-led rearguard can be flat-footed and the defensive midfielders, Fernandinho and Fernando, fail to offer protection. When the Plan A of attack allows goals at the wrong end and yields none at the opposition’s, Pellegrini’s Plan B is simply to keep on keeping on. Only once in the Champions League has the approach worked: in the game against Bayern two weeks ago, when Xabi Alonso allowed in Sergio Agüero for a late equaliser and the forward scored again for a memorable 3-2 victory. Roma know victory would take them through and are intent on taking the contest to City. Garcia said: “There’s no other option, we need to play for the win and nothing else. There’s no need to use the word ‘motivation’. But, besides playing at 100%, we’ll need to use our heads.” Although Kompany, David Silva, Stevan Jovetic and Fernandinho should be available after training on Monday morning, Pellegrini’s challenge is to qualify without Agüero, who picked up knee ligament damage on Saturday evening. The Argentinian has 19 goals in 21 appearances this term so he is a big miss. “Agüero’s absence is sad news,” said García. “Great players like him should be involved out there. We know that Manchester City are a good side. It will be very tough but I’m sure we can do it. “Every match is important, although [this one] is special because it’s like a cup final. We should have been out of the running by this stage because we were in the fourth pot and yet we’re still in the hunt. Credit to us that we still have the chance to play this cup final in front of our fans at a passionate Olimpico.” If City manage a score draw then this would take them through if CSKA fail to better that result at Bayern. But if the Russian champions do so then Leonid Slutsky’s team are in the draw for the last 16 and City are out. What this scenario may mean for Pellegrini’s life expectancy as manager would then become a debate centred around how robust City’s title defence proves – the gap to Chelsea is only three points – and who else may be available to fill any vacancy should Khaldoon al-Mubarak, the chairman, the chief executive, Ferran Soriano, and the sporting director, Txiki Begiristain, decide to push the button. Pellegrini is far more popular than Mancini and his stock is higher than the Italian’s became because of the Italian’s divisive style and nature. But this is a ruthless business. Mansour has not invested more than £1bn, including the shiny £200m City Football Academy – which opened on Monday – for his team not to be an established and dominant force in Europe. |