How Manchester City neutralised Barcelona, the world's most dangerous team. 

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Barcelona were well-beaten at the Etihad Stadium.

 Manchester City’s attack were truly outstanding in Tuesday’s comeback victory over Barcelona: a victory that few expected but was unquestionably the best European night in Sheikh Mansour’s reign.

Scoring three times after having gone behind to the world’s greatest strikeforce is impressive enough,
but shutting Lionel Messi, Luis Suarez and Neymar out while actively going in search of goals really is testament to how far Pep Guardiola’s side have already come. But just how did they do it?

Pressing and breaking in numbers.

A depleted Barcelona defence, missing Gerard Pique and Jordi Alba was a weakness, and Pep knew it.
The Spanish visitors started so quickly that City had the rug swept out from underneath them, but once
 they had regained their composure they set about targeting opportunities to win possession high up
the pitch.

  

Roberto is forced back towards his own goal.

Usually so composed at the back, Barcelona’s new-look defence were troubled when put under
pressure, and City pounced quickly and efficiently. Sergi Roberto was often the focus, and doing
so led to the equaliser.

 

 City win the ball and suddenly have five on three.

Roberto was ushered in-field while Sergio Aguero did enough to prevent the backpass to goalkeeper Marc-Andre ter Stegen. The young Spaniard committed the cardinal sin of Sunday League football by playing a ball across his own goal and City struck. In an instant they turned a defensive situation into a five-on-three attack, and suddenly it was 1-1.
With Barcelona reeling City pushed for another, this time Fernandinho catching Roberto in possession in central midfield and launching an attack that the Brazilian eventually got on the end of, but could not finish.

Tough tacklers

Kevin De Bruyne, David Silva and Raheem Sterling last season made up the trio of attacking midfielders in Manuel Pellegrini’s 4-2-3-1, where defensive duties were not so important.
Now, under Guardiola, Silva plays in a deeper role and is making significantly more tackles than in any other recent season. Sterling is too, with the only other year in which he came close when Liverpool challenged for the title in 2013/14.

Against Barcelona, no player made more tackles than De Bruyne’s four. Silva gained possession seven times, which was at least two more than any other player on the pitch.

These players will rightly consider themselves at their best on the ball, and might previously have thought it a waste to use expend energy off it, but they have bought into Guardiola’s ideas and are making sacrifices for the cause. It worked to perfection at the Etihad on Tuesday night.

Ceding possession.

For only the second time in Guardiola’s reign, City had less than 55 per cent possession in a game. The other match was at the Nou Camp a fortnight previously.

Even then, City saw 47 per cent of the ball, while at the Etihad they had just 35 per cent. It is one of Pep’s greatest adversaries, Jose Mourinho, who enjoyed such success in trying to exploit opponents’ errors by allowing them to have the ball for extended periods, and playing in such a way is not something you would normally associate with Guardiola.

But the 4-0 defeat in Spain convinced him that trying to play their own game against a side like Barcelona was suicide. Allowing their opponents to control the game while biding their time worked wonders. Despite having two-thirds of the possession share, Barcelona had only eight shots to City’s 13.