‘Over-thinker’ Pep managed to cruise past a pragmatic Diego Simeone

The media, all the Manchester City fans and football fans in general were definitely thinking about Pep Guardiola’s statement when they couldn’t find Phil Foden in the starting line-up. Just before the match, Pep called himself an over-thinker and that is exactly where the story began. It lived for around 70 minutes as Kevin De Bruyne solved all the problems.

From the very first whistle, Diego Simeone’s men knew how to approach the game. They are anyway defensive in nature and are dependent on counter-attacks. However, they had no answer to Manchester City’s press. Guardiola named Rodri in the middle of the park with De Bruyne and Ilkay Gundogan by his side. So, by the line-up it is crystal clear that Pep wanted to control the play in the midfield and wanted to keep the possession. Now, Atletico didn’t really bother that and that was a surprise and that is exactly where we saw the pragmatic form of Simeone or in short, the Classic Diego!

Simeone wanted to take the match to his den and wanted to finish it at even terms. Thus, from the first half itself, Atletico players were wasting time and were playing the brand of people that showed the desire of the manager. However, one change in the 68th minute changed everything in the match. The 21-year-old Phil Foden’s introduction changed things for City. Fresh new legs always help and City got the result in a few seconds. Foden set up De Bruyne with a brilliant pass and the Belgian made no mistake to put it past Jan Oblak. The players celebrated of course but Guardiola’s celebration is what attracted everyone. The manager celebrated by fist pumping the air before tossing his water bottle. The Etihad went nuts with that and Diego Simeone’s expression told us the entire story.

His plans failed as Manchester City defeated Atletico Madrid by a goal to nil. Even though City took a narrow lead over the Madrid-based club but there’s a lot to play for when the two teams meet at Wanda Metropolitano. All the fans will hope is for Guardiola to stop overthinking and Simeone to stop his pragmatism and to go all out against a much organised Manchester City.