Source: Daily_Mail
Manchester City meanies: Shay Given and Co are the new unbeatables
Whatever happens to Manchester City over the course of the next nine months, they have improved on one aspect of last season already.[LNB]The three away wins that Mark Hughes' team have racked up in the past fortnight or so have beaten last year's dismal domestic tally by one.[LNB]That City have scored relatively few goals in their winning start to the season will have surprised a few people. That they have yet to concede one will certainly have shocked a few more.[LNB]For Hughes, it really has been the perfect start. Not only has it relieved some of the pressure brought by a summer of heavy spending, it has also deflated the notion that City would transpire to be an English version of Real Madrid's galacticos.[LNB] Safe keeping: Given has helped City to be tighter at the back this seaosn[LNB]As the likes of Roque Santa Cruz and Emmanuel Adebayor arrived to join Craig Bellamy, Robinho, Shaun Wright-Phillips and Stephen Ireland this summer, City certainly began to look a little top heavy. [LNB]When the visiting team broke the length of the field to score a superb opening goal in the third minute at Blackburn on the opening day, then spent much of the next 42 minutes in their own half, it was tempting to wonder if every City game this season might end 3-3. [LNB]So far, it has not been that way. City have the best defensive record in the Barclays Premier League and it has been a long time since anybody has been able to say that. [LNB]'Not conceding in three league games is very good for us,' said midfielder Gareth Barry. 'We have had three tough league games so this is all we could ask for. The clean sheets are a big bonus. We have played some good stuff at times but it's important to be secure at the other end as well.'[LNB]The presence of Shay Given in City's goal remains key to the improvement in Hughes's team. Signed last January, he remains perhaps the most important arrival of the manager's 14 months at Eastlands. At Blackburn and at Portsmouth, Given made important saves of quality.[LNB]The more recent arrivals of defenders Kolo Toure and Joleon Lescotthave been important, too. Last season's central defensive pairing ofMicah Richards and Richard Dunne was calamitous at times.[LNB] High spirits: Toure's presence has improved City's rearguard[LNB]There is, however, more to defensive solidity than merely signing good players. It requires the appropriate work ethic and proper organisation.[LNB]Hughes has always been an organised and pragmatic coach. It was these attributes that brought him individual moments of success with the Welsh national team at the start of the decade.[LNB]Last season he was let down by some players with poor attitude and others who were too slow to learn. The Brazilian Elano fell in to the first category while his former club captain Dunne as regrettable as it was fell in to the latter. [LNB]Reflecting on changes in personnel in the year since the Arab takeover, Hughes said last night: 'It's unprecedented really, the amount of business we have done and we won't go through this process again because we won't need to.[LNB]'But we've gone through the bad part. It's been stimulating, it's been frustrating and it's been worrying at times because no-one could quite predict how it was going to pan out. But where we are now is a hell of a better place than we were 12 months ago. We feel we have the blocks in place.'[LNB]Among Hughes's staff, delegation is key and much of the day-to-day work is done by assistant manager Mark Bowen and coach Eddie Niedzwiecki.[LNB]Bowen, for example, now takes responsibility for set-pieces, an area in which City had been lacking at both ends for years. At City there is none of the much-discussed zonal marking employed by coaches like Rafael Benitez at Liverpool.[LNB] Solid foundations: The clean sheets of Given et al have allowed City to win their first three league games[LNB]Instead the emphasis is placed on the responsibility of individuals to carry out specifically allocated roles at free kicks and corners. Here, fine detail and intelligence is everything. Last season to Hughes's frustration it often didn't work. [LNB]Messages often repeated never seemed to sink in. This time there has been a noticeable improvement, although more is still required, of course.[LNB]Hughes remains concerned about the reliability of full backs Richards and Wayne Bridge and City can still look a little vulnerable in their own half during open play. [LNB]While commentating on radio last Thursday, summariser Mark Bright was adamant that City would struggle defensively against better sides. As such, the next home game, against Arsenal, will certainly be interesting.[LNB]That afternoon may be one for Dutch enforcer Nigel de Jong, so far unused. At least now Hughes has such options. Horses for courses and all that. [LNB]Like he said himself, the blocks do look to be in place.[LNB] We're just warming up, insists Manchester City boss Mark HughesAdebayor hits out at Arsenal fans again! City's fans inspire me, claims strikerMANCHESTER CITY FC
