Manuel Pellegrini: Can 'The Engineer' fix Manchester City?

Mending Manchester City

The common conception seems to be that the newly appointed director of football Txiki Begiristain wants the club to adopt a 4-3-3 formation across all levels of football and develop a footballing culture similar to that of his former club, Barcelona.

While this is an admirable quest, City fans must hope that it doesn’t interfere with the way Pellegrini wants to set his team up. One only needs to look at Pellegrini’s single season in charge of Real Madrid to see how easily that could make his best laid plans go awry.

Pellegrini’s arrival coincided with the world record transfers of Kaka and Ronaldo and subsequent arrivals of Karim Benzema and Xabi Alonso in a mind boggling £200 million spending spree. But it also coincided with the sale of Wesley Sneijder and Arjen Robben, players who Pellegrini didn’t want sold.

Sneijder, in particular, would’ve been perfect as one of the playmakers behind the strikers and went on to have his best season in club football as led Jose Mourinho’s Inter to the Champions League title. Things got so bad and politically heated up that Pellegrini was the target of a public smear campaign by the Madrid media to pave the way for him to be replaced by Mourinho.

The question though, remains – how are Manchester City likely to shape up next season?

This is how City could probably line-up next season (with the possibility of Eden Dzeko staying at the club). Note: Click on the image to enlarge it.

Although the 4-2-2-2 formation below seems very similar to the way Mancini’s City often set up, City under Pellegrini will have more cohesion, more inter-changeability among the top four players and a more organised approach to attacking.

David Silva is likely to become even more prominent in Pellegrini’s pet role, and Samir Nasri needs to step up and show his mettle. Jack Rodwell can be a viable alternative to Yaya Toure or Fernandinho, especially if Fernandinho takes time to settle into the Premier League.

Defensively, things are set to remain tight and the arrival of Pellegrini should put a stop to the ill fated experiments with a back three, which undermined City’s defence at times last season.

Alternatively, a 4-2-3-1 may be employed against the top teams and in Europe. This would give more defensive solidity to the spine of the team and allow City to exploit the pace of new signing Jesus Navas down the right wing.

But the most promising aspect of Pellegrini’s appointment is his impressive Champions League record. Villarreal’s journey to the semi-finals was unprecedented and was cut short at the second last hurdle only by Jens Lehmann’s last minute penalty save.

And despite Malaga’s fall from financial grace, they performed admirably well in this season’s Champions League, losing to eventual finalists Dortmund in the quarter finals by two injury time goals, the second of which was offside.

Pellegrini is the only man to have led two Champions League debutants to the quarter finals or beyond. For a Manchester City team which has failed to progress beyond the group stages twice in two years, Pellegrini’s arrival will be akin to that of a lifeguard, although they’ll be hoping that he leaves his luck behind.