Opponents have worked out how to play against Manchester City and Pep Guardiola’s side are “not that confident any more” said Slaven Bilic, whose West Ham United side play them in the FA Cup at the London Stadium on Friday night.
Bilic believes high pressing is the key to knocking City out of their stride and that, combined with a drop in confidence, has left them vulnerable after a dominant start to the Premier League campaign. The manager insists his West Ham side go into the match in good form, despite losing their past two matches.
“Some teams tried to press them even in the early period of the season,” Bilic said of City, “because we knew from Germany and from Spain how they would play. But they were coming out of that pressing more than now.
“After you have three or four wins on the trot then the opponent may be pressing you but you are not scared. OK, you can occasionally lose the ball but you don’t care; at the end of the day, it’s the plan. But after you make some mistakes and it ends in defeat then you think twice about it. You try it again but you are not that confident any more. It’s like a chain.”
Bilic believes Guardiola will continue to implement the style of play that made him so successful at Barcelona and Bayern Munich and that it is up to City’s players to take responsibility to adapt those tactics when necessary.
“The manager has his philosophy and the manager guides you as a player but at the end of the day it’s your decision [as a player],” he said. “If you are in the box, if you don’t know where you are because you were ball-watching and you are in front of your own goal, no manager is expecting you to get the ball on your chest.
“It’s always the player’s decision. If you are talking about Guardiola I have seen [Gerard] Piqué putting the ball in the stands when necessary. It’s the player’s decision – always.”
West Ham had a mixed festive period, beating Burnley and Hull City and thumping Swansea away 4-1 before losing to Leicester City and Manchester United. Their performance against United gave Bilic confidence, especially since the defeat came after the dismissal of Sofiane Feghouli, whose red card has been rescinded.
“I think definitely the players are starting to get their confidence back”, Bilic said. “I don’t think we put in great performances against Burnley and Hull but we got six points. Then in the last couple of games we played well. There were a lot of positives from these games and that’s why I’m optimistic. Despite the defeats it has been very positive.
“I was happy when I heard the news [of Feghouli’s successful appeal],” Bilic added, “but it’s happened to us four times – that’s a kind of a record. It’s good that the committee have overturned the verdict and we are happy. But it’s four games where the decisions were clearly against us.”
Bilic’s side go into the FA Cup tie with “big ambitions” and he said the trophy has not suffered any loss in status, despite the dominance of the Premier League.
“It has changed in some of the countries but not here,” he said. “The gap came when the European Cup became the Champions League – before that it was just the league and the cup in every country. But when the Champions League came in and the Uefa Cup went down and the Cup Winners’ Cup disappeared, not only the big clubs but those big enough were only dreaming about being in the Champions League.
“In England and Germany the cup was always important, especially the FA Cup. The FA Cup was just below the Premiership, just below. It was a massive game and still is.
“Now in most of the countries, in Italy or France or Spain, you can see how they are taking the cup seriously again. Even Juventus and Paris Saint-Germain. So the cup is back. But here it is the same as when I played and watched it on the TV before I was a manager. The FA Cup never lost its size.”
