City were narrowly edged out of a tight encounter against Chelsea last night, losing 2-1 at the Bank.
Of course, you know that unless you live under a rock. Still, it was a proud night to be an Imps’ fan, and one we’ll remember for many years to come. A few of the Chelsea players might have nightmares about it as well – Fernandez, Chalobah and Jorgensen all likely to want to put it from their minds.
Why? They faced a threat they don’t often see: set pieces and long throws. It’s an approach that French international Malo Gusto certainly wasn’t familiar with.
“The way that they play, I have never seen that in my life before, but that is their qualities and they tried to win the game,” he said after the game. “So we had to deal with that and I think we did quite well today.”
“The first half was very complicated for us to get into the game, but second half was much better because we came back with more energy and more desire. We kept fighting on the pitch in the second half and I think that’s why we won. Very happy to get into the next round.”
He wasn’t the only Blues figure to express their opinion on how City play. Enzo Maresca has played in this sort of game – he appeared for West Brom against Halfiax Town in the same competition, and he stressed that some of his players have not had the same experience.
“We prepared the game thinking exactly in the way it was the first half, and sometimes it’s about desire, it’s about winning the second ball, but it’s also about experience,” said the former Juventus and Fiorentina man.
“Jamie Gittens never played against League One, these kind of games. Jorrel Hato never played this kind of game. You have to play in a different way.”
“The first half, we were aware of the game that we expect in terms of long balls, duels, throw-ins, free-kick, every time inside the box.”
He stressed they were a different type of game, but wasn’t as offensive as to suggest we were just a long ball team. Instead, he pointed to ‘double desire’ in duels, something which certainly feels fair.
“I know that some of them, they didn’t play these kind of games, I asked today how many of them they play against, you know, League One team, because you need to know a different kind, you need to play a different kind of game.
“It’s not the same game, because the desire is double from them, from duels, these kind of things. We struggled in the first half, I think in the second half we were much better.”
They were much better in the second half, and that was the reason they are in the hat for the next round, not us. However, we certainly gave them food for thought and have hopefully added to the experiences of younger English players, like Gittens and George.