#360view: Pellegrini responsible for sad farewell at City

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  • Manuel Pellegrini is Manchester City's most successful manager.

    In terms of goodwill to their managers in their respective final home matches of the season, there couldn’t have been a starker contrast between the King Power and the Etihad Stadium just under 24 hours later.

    Of course, celebrating a league title will ensure the sort of reception granted to Claudio Ranieri who enjoyed Andrea Bocelli singing ‘Nessun Dorma’, essentially in his honour (along with winning a league title, that’s surely two items firmly ticked off his bucket list).

    However, while Ranieri was afforded the sort of gesture which was as surreal as it was spectacular – perfectly encapsulating Leicester’s season – Manuel Pellegrini’s final exit from the Etihad was decidedly more underwhelming.

    After a rather disappointing 2-2 draw with Arsenal, a stadium that had held 54,425 for the match emptied to leave no more than 15,000 to applaud the team around the pitch in the traditional lap of honour as Pellegrini delivered a brief address. You can only hope, for his sake, he didn’t have something more ambitious planned.

    It was a humiliating goodbye to, in terms of trophies won and win percentage, the club’s most successful manager and an individual who remains almost universally admired by fans of the other 19 Premier League clubs and around the world. The Chilean has made a cliche of the term, ‘class act’, so often has it been applied to his character during his three seasons in Manchester.

    But while the obvious point to make is that City’s supporters should share Pellegrini’s ignominy in how he’s been put out to pasture, and that they’re not deserving of a manager so dignified, at the same time the question of why it happened needs to be raised, as road congestion concerns surely didn’t stretch into the tens of thousands.

    By tonight, City could have fallen out of the top four for the first time this season (based on completed matchdays) and with Manchester United hosting Bournemouth (five defeats in their last seven games) at Old Trafford on Sunday their chances of returning will be slim.

    For a club of such bountiful resources, in terms of playing staff and financial support, to not secure a top-four berth is a disaster. Especially given they held a seven-point advantage over fifth-placed United at the end of January.

    The downturn in form since that fateful Guardiola announcement on February 1 has been awful, and potentially catastrophic; just six Premier League wins in 13 matches and dropped points against Norwich and Newcastle. Pellegrini does deserve sympathy for the circumstances he’s had to work under, but it cannot solely account for a dismal end to his tenure.

    There has been the Champions League semi-final, a notable achievement. But bar the second-leg against Paris Saint-Germain, in the knockout stages were there any performances that truly stood out?

    The 90 minutes last week in the Bernabeu was as bad as City have been under Pellegrini and in many ways summed up the malaise; a listless display lacking any character or conviction. And while, again, technically it must be difficult to motivate yourself and your players knowing your more fashionable replacement is less than two months away, it’s still a Champions League semi-final. And, at 62, how many more games of that magnitude will he get to manage in?

    The Chilean has been responsible for keeping Martin Demichelis as a serious option at centre-back; picked Yaya Toure whenever remotely fit; only woke up to the fact Kelechi Iheanacho is a more multi-skilled forward than Wilfried Bony in April; has shown little to no faith in any academy players and who’s handed more league appearances to Jesus Navas than any other outfield player at the club. There is also the damning statistic that City have failed to beat a single top-seven opponent this season.

    ‘This Charming Man’ by name he may be, but there’s been nothing but apathy permeating through City in 2016. And that attitude starts with the manager. His increasingly downbeat, glum, sometimes morose press conferences are a fan’s window into his personality. They do little to raise any kind of passion either way.

    So while events on Sunday were uncomfortable, embarrassing and a little sad for a thoroughly decent man, it didn’t happen without reason or some justification.

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