Match date: 12 April 2015

The Manchester derby comes at a time when the two teams are on very different paths as shown over the last few weeks. Manchester United have put in a string of good performances recently, including wins against Liverpool and Tottenham, as Van Gaal’s philosophy seems to have finally taken hold.

On the blue side of Manchester, however, Pellegrini’s side have faltered, losing to Liverpool, Burnley, and Crystal Palace in the Premier League as well as being knocked out of the Champions League by Barcelona (1st leg | 2nd leg).

Van Gaal continued with the starting XI that has featured recently and that beat Aston Villa in their last league outing with the exception of Marcos Rojo who was dropped to the bench in favour of Chris Smalling. Van Gaal continued with a 4-1-4-1 which the Dutchman has employed in Manchester United’s recent run of good form.

Pellegrini made a notable change in shape, opting to play a 4-2-3-1 rather than a 4-4-2 with James Milner coming into the side. Pablo Zabaleta replaced Bacary Sagna at right back.

Silva, Milner, Carrick

One of the first parts of the match that stuck out was that Pellegrini had opted to play a 4-2-3-1 with James Milner ahead of Yaya Toure and Fernandinho in a central area. This move was to try to stop the amount of influence on that match that Michael Carrick could have. Carrick’s role during Manchester United’s ‘revival’ has been pivotal and so it made sense for Pellegrini to try to stop the deep lying midfielder from being able to get on the ball. To the Manchester City bosses credit, it seemed to work early on. Manchester City were dominant in the opening stages of the match as Milner did a good job closing down Carrick and it made it hard for Manchester United to get any sort of hold on the game. Manchester City made the most of their early dominance as well with Agüero scoring in the eighth minute. So much of City’s best play was the result of, not only Milner’s disciplined approach to Carrick, but also the interchange between Milner and Silva. When Manchester City were in possession, Silva would drift inside and Milner would drift out wide, both movements allowing City to get numbers up in crucial areas and making the duo hard to pick up. The opening goal was a perfect example as Silva made an unmarked run into the Manchester United penalty area with Milner finding him.

Manchester City’s dominance did not last long. After the goal, James Milner began to push to the Manchester United centre backs, as did Agüero and it meant that Carrick was allowed to find more space and began to move the ball with much more ease and Manchester United were able to begin turning the tide of the game. Below is a good example of Milner’s drifting. Agüero has pressed to Jones forcing the centre back to play square to Smalling with Milner then closing down and leaving Carrick to himself. In this particular screen capture, Agüero is close to Carrick, but Agüero was less keen to drop as the match went on.

It is no coincidence that when Carrick began to find more space, Manchester United began to play better. The English midfielder was able to carry the ball forward and pick out passes into Mata, Young, Fellaini, and Herrera, and Rooney as well as out to Daley Blind as Manchester United found a lot of success down that side of the pitch, which will be discussed later.

Fellaini and the Left Side

Aside from Carrick finding space to get on the ball, Fellaini’s positioning began to be a huge part of Manchester United’s growth in the game. In the opening stages, the Belgian was occupied by Yaya Toure as the Ivorian did some good work getting back and forth with his side controlling the match. As Manchester United started to get a hold on the match, however, Toure began to position himself too high. He was sometimes tempted to get forward to put pressure on Carrick with Milner pressuring the Manchester United centre backs as mentioned above. This left Fellaini with a lot of space to himself and it became a troublesome affair for Zabaleta and Kompany, as both were caught in two minds about picking up the big Belgian. Below is a good example of the space that Fellaini began to find. Notice Yaya Toure’s position as well.

Fellaini began to drift into a wide left position, putting himself up against Zabaleta, when Jones and Smalling had the ball, and offering a ‘long ball’ option. It was an easy target for Manchester United and allowed the home side to get numbers up on the left side with Young free from Zabaleta and Blind making good runs forward, undeterred by Navas.

An excellent example of Fellaini’s presence in that zone was Mata’s goal in the second half. At this point, Kompany had been withdrawn through injury and Demichelis moved to right centre back and began to track Fellaini’s movement. On Mata’s goal, Demichelis tracked Fellaini and won the ball that was played into the Belgian, but gave away possession cheaply allowing Blind to play to Rooney and Rooney to lay the ball off to (an offside) Mata.

So much of Manchester United’s play came down the left side. Fellaini’s influence has been noted, but Ashley Young also had a good game for the home side. He got a goal from good movement inside the Manchester City penalty area and played an excellent cross in for Fellaini’s go-ahead goal as well as the ball in for Smalling’s goal.

Pellegrini’s Changes

The Chilean was forced to make a change at half time, bringing off Vincent Kompany and replacing him with Mangala. The next moves by Pellegrini were interesting. Nasri was introduced for Milner, which allowed Silva to play centrally and added a bit more creativity to Manchester City who were down 2-1 at the time of the Frenchman’s introduction. This made sense from a stand point of adding more creativity to the side, but also left Manchester City a bit more open. The second change, however, was a bit more questionable as Lampard was brought on for Navas, which moved Silva back out wide. Losing 3-1 at this point, it was interesting that Pellegrini opted for Lampard rather than Džeko.

Conclusion

A bright start by Manchester City seemed to be undone by the lack of continued discipline from the blue side of Manchester. Milner went away from Carrick, allowing the deep lying midfielder to get on the ball and dictate the game for Manchester United while Fellaini was able to find space in between the lines of Manchester City’s back four and midfield and pushed out wide to help his side get numbers up in the wide areas.

Manchester City’s poor run of form continues and they now find themselves below Manchester United in fourth place with Southampton and Liverpool closing in for the final Champions League spot.