Beating City will require more than effort, Nuno and his back room staff will need a clear, disciplined plan. West Ham have the tools to trouble City, but only if they lean into their strengths and learn from the few teams who have consistently caused Guardiola problems.
Attack Space City Leave behind
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There’s a big difference between [Real Madrid who beat City 3-0 last night](https://www.claretandhugh.info/west-hams-next-opponents-outclassed-by-real-madrid-in-hammers-warm-up/), and West Ham, yet when looking at match day analysis, City are at their most dangerous when they can overload central areas. They commit numbers forward, leaving space behind their full-backs. West Ham can hopefully exploit this by attacking the channels quickly, and playing early direct passes into space rather than trying to build slowly.
City’s biggest vulnerability has also ironically been scoring from set plays, though this similarly is an issue for West Ham who also have one of the worse records defending corners in the Premier League.
Pressing City for 90 minutes is suicidal, but targeted pressing triggers could work.
City will inevitably dominate possession, but possession doesn’t equal control. Teams who beat City, don’t panic without the ball, they wait for the right moments to attack and stay disciplined even when defending for long stretches.
Nuno usually sets his team to defend and attack on the break. Losing Summerville before such a crucial game won’t help, yet there are other options, and our Portuguese Head Coach will inevitably have a plan B up his sleeve.
The history books show just seven wins in twenty four home games against Man City in the Premier League and a 3-1 home loss last season.
For those brave souls out there you can get 60/1 odds on a 3-0 West Ham win – or 12/1 on City and the score line reversed.
COYI!