Manchester City: Lack of concise gameplan is hurting Pep Guardiola.

The Spanish coach hoped to get settled for a gameplan, but City’s struggle to create chances requires another tweak.

Pep Guardiola’s biggest dilemma in his 14-month reign at Etihad is finding the winning formula. The past season, the lack of quality full-backs forced the manager to send his sides in different shapes, resulting in a chaotic season of experimenting and fixing the holes.

The team finished the last season on a high note, winning six out of last eight games with Guardiola’s opting for a 4-3-3 formation.

City went on a spending spare in the summer, drawing $160 million from its bank account for young and energetic full-backs Danilo, Kyle Walker and Benjamin Mendy. The coach was believed to finally work out his game plan, and more of the same was expected.

Things changed again as Guardiola opted for a 3-5-2 formation heading into this season, with the aim for more stability. In the first two matches, the team couldn’t break the first gear. City required two individual errors to earn a difficult victory against debutant Brighton, then only managed to salvage a point at home against Everton. The team struggled to create chances, which the manager should blame nobody but himself.

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Creating numerical superiority in the half-space area is the foundation of Guardiola’s possession-based philosophy, which was demonstrated by “Juego de Posicion” during the manager’s stint at Barcelona. Most of the times, the players were instructed to overload a specific half-space, then switched the ball to the other sides when the opportunity arose.

Guardiola opted for a more direct style in Munich, where he got the services of Arjen Robben, Kingsley Coman, Frank Ribery, Douglas Costa and David Alaba. Bayern would dominate the flanks thanks to a combination of the full-backs, the ball-near midfielders and the inside forwards.

The way Guardiola setting up his team has done more harm than good. City easily dominates the ball but lacks creativity in the final third. The wing-backs are often isolated from the build-up. The back three rarely exercise any kind of risk in their passing. Playmakers David Silva and Kevin de Bruyne are instructed to drop deep too often, leaving City lacks the number where it matters.

Most of the time, City relies on the third-man run to seek for dismarking, though the disorganized off-the-ball movements killed the plan. Guardiola’s insistence to maintain the gap between the attackers cause the players to run into the harm’s way. City controlled the ball, but couldn’t find a way to break the defensive line because of the lack of opening. The opposing team was happy to let City keeping the ball, as long as the ball wasn’t ventured into the danger area.

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Guardiola has been in charge of Manchester City for 14 months, though he had an additional four months in advance planning his team after receiving his job announcement since February 2016. However, he hasn’t figured his best team, and he does not know his best formation, either.

Aguero and Jesus are nowhere to be found. Sane and Walker can’t make an impact by themselves. Silva and De Bruyne lack receivers in the danger area. Elsewhere, Raheem Sterling, Bernardo Silva, Yaya Toure, Benjamin Mendy are left on the bench as a collateral damage of the manager’s failure to solve the puzzle. Guardiola might have to tweak his side one more time, and he needs to do it ASAP.

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