Saturday's early kick-off sees newly promoted Manchester City entertain Hull at the Etihad stadium. Both sides are level pegging on points in league, having both won and lost in the opening two weeks of the season. The home side will no doubt the more aggrieved of the two, given how they surrendered their 1-0 lead away to Cardiff last week to lose 3-2, and the defeat in South Wales has left Manuel Pellegrini with a few quandaries to ponder over the past five days. Here, we'll look at five key areas which needed addressing ahead of tomorrow's clash:
5. Defending Set Pieces
Both of Frazier Campbell's goals for Cardiff came from corners one from each side. Without pointing the finger of blame, as that's never productive, the obvious cause for both of the goals is simply the transition from Roberto Mancini's zonal-marking system to the new man-marking structure preferred by Pellegrini. Granted, both approaches have their pros and cons. Last season, Ajax proved how easy it was to play around the zonal-marking, and as was evidenced on Sunday, if you lose your man then it could prove to be just as costly with Pellegrini's method. As they say though, practice makes perfect, and surely this would have been one of the primary focuses in training this week.
Originally from Manchester, I'm currently residing in Melbourne as part of a round the world trip that I embarked on in November 2011.
I primarily write on football and I'm a lifelong Man City fan and current season ticket holder. I'll try to share my views from an unbiased perspective, but I can't promise anything.
