The first half had gotten off to an exciting start after the sudden counterattack from Tottenham, but with them losing possession of the ball the dynamic of the ga changed sowhat.
Man City was already a team that was good at keep possession, staying patient and slipping through like ghosts the mont a crack appeared in the defense, and with Tottenham choosing to sit back to defend, this led to much longer spells where Man City having the ball.
The match soon turned into one where Man City almost always had the ball while the Tottenham stayed compact in the midfield and defense.
Every once in a while, they would leave a space for the Man City players to try to play through, but often tis it was a trap that they used to quickly surround the player with the ball and steal possession before the tried to launch a counterattack.
Of course, with Man City’s insanely technical players, they sotis managed to create chances to threaten the Tottenham team, but sohow the scores remained nil nil half an hour into the ga.
The ga had seen much excitent that had kept the Tottenham fans cheering even though it looked like their team was being played around with.
The Tottenham fans cheered to encourage their players while waiting for the sudden rapid counterattacks from their team, hoping for a goal before long.
However try as they might, another fifteen minutes of exciting football filled with both sides making so more attempts at goal soon passed by and the referee held up the board to signal two minutes of added ti.
With the first half coming to an end, the two sides tried a few desperate last minute attempts to force a change to the scoreline before the referee blew his whistle to end the first half.
Tottenham even tried keeping possess and forced the Man City side into their own half for one of the few tis since the ga began, but their attempt ended with a long distance shot from Alli that was punched wide by Ederson.
One unprofitable corner kick later was followed by the sharp blast of the referee’s whistle to end the ga.
{And there we have it. For the first ti this season for this two sides, it’s half ti}
{There’s been a lot of attacking football as well as a fair amount of defensive brilliance}
{This scoreline is not due to a lack of attacking football, but rather because both defences have been at the top of their ga, canceling each other our}
{The managers of the two teams will have quite a lot to say to their players as while the tactics are working well enough, there may need to be a little tweaks made to finally lead to goals}
{One thing is for sure, the second half is set to be a more exciting half that than the first, all things being equal}
{For now, we’ll take a break and will be back after a quarter of an hour} the comntator briefed the crowd while the players and headed down the tunnels to their respective locker rooms.
"Sit down guys, cool off quickly. Hydrate yourselves, it’s not over yet," Nuno began as the team arrived at the locker room.
"We are defending well and our counterattack tactic is clearly working and we’ve caught them by surprise a few tis,"
"However, you guys haven’t been clinical enough. Bergwijn, I’ve told you many tis, run when the space, run and don’t look back, you’ve taken too much ti a few tis, allowing those guys to rearrange themselves and surround Son in the center,"
"Your passes also need to hit the mark when you’re trying to make a final pass, we can’t keep losing ball in dangerous situations like that or we will also face a counterattack that may destroy us,"
"Lucas, you need to take your ti to aim more. Yes we want fast counterattack, but it don’t- doesn’t have to rush so much that your shooting position is awkward and you shoot wide every ti,"
"We could have buried the ga a few tis already today, but we slipped up. We can still win because like I say, the tactics is working, we just need to be more clinical," Nuno said and the players nodded as they clearly understood what the manager was talking about.
Man City clearly wasn’t a team with stellar defensive players or tactics so it wasn’t too difficult to catch them on the counter, especially on the right since Cancelo loved moving up the field to involve himself more in his team’s attacks.
Benjamin ndy helped a lot since he stayed back more, but even that was just barely good enough.
The only reason Tottenham hadn’t scored so far was because they hadn’t fashioned the perfect opportunity in front of goal, but that was only a matter of ti if the City side didn’t make adjustnts to their defensive tactics.
"I’ll need you guys to be very focused in the second half}
"Our opponents are not a team that ever play defensively. Their only tactics when things get hot for them is to get even hotter than their situation,"
"In the second half, they will co at us with even more ferocity as they try to outscore us instead of fixing the hole in their defense,"
"That is a crisis and an opportunity. Watch and wait. Defend well, and when the space opens up, we hit them hard," Nuno added so extra to the halfti talk as the ti ran down.
Soon the players were rushing back out to the field for the second half.
As they walked out to the pitch, Nuno called his assistant over,
"Let the bench start warming up as soon as we’re back outside. I will have to shake things up if nothing happens soon,"
The assistant manager nodded and kept walking forward, ready to do his duty.
Jason followed along from behind as the players headed to their technical area.
His focus had mostly been on the tempo of the ga as there were many who pointed it out as the major difference between Premier League football and most of the other famous leagues.
So far he had only seen a little bit, but he kept his eyes peeled as he waited with anticipation for the second half of the ga.
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