Manchester United's collapse
Last weekend against QPR, Manchester United's diamond glittered in a 4 - 0 win, but seven days on, many would suggest that you would be making a mistake adding it to a wedding band for your fiancé.
In truth, the diamond gives Manchester United so much more potency when they are on the front foot as it allows Angel Di Maria to both run in an inside left channel and down the flank. That was visible during the first half of the 5 - 3 win.
The shape also gives United an option to play a diagonal ball from the inside-left directly to the forward line which they attempted a couple of times.
But while a diamond is a tough nut to crack scientifically, Leicester's energy was able to drill through a porous United defence in a second half salvo.
The weak point seemed to be the channel between central defence and the full-backs, particularly on United's left side.
Take this Squawka graphic which shows where Leicester's chances were created. It shows a snapshot of the match from minute 55 to 85 when the Foxes threw the cat among the pigeons with four goals:
Six of Leicester's seven crosses came from that side during that period, with the Squawka heat map showing the concentration of Nigel Pearson's team coming down both flanks, but especially down the side occupied by Marcos Rojo and Tyler Blackett.
And note how United's passing seemed unable to penetrate the right back area of Leicester's defence during that 30 minute spell:
Find more graphics from the match on Squawka.com
Leicester made 10 interceptions between minute 55 and 85 - the same number as United - but Squawka's graphic shows eight of those being made on the right side of the pitch as the Foxes stopped attacks in their tracks.
Former Ireland midfielder Stephen Reid was on to something when he pointed out that the Reds need to address their defence in January and it seems strange that they did not add to that area with all the money they spent during the summer.
Listen to Manuel Pellegrini's post-match comments about Mourinho's tactics above
Ozil and Welbeck emerge
In contrast to Manchester United's slip from brewing optimism to fermenting despair again, Mesut Ozil and Danny Welbeck went from zero to hero with goalscoring performances against Aston Villa.
Ozil has often started from the left with freedom to drift inside. But this time he started centrally with freedom to drift out wide which suits him much more and frees him up from defensive duty.
An intriguing big game
I expected Jose Mourinho to try and turn yesterday's 1 - 1 draw into a cagey contest by dropping Oscar in favour of Ramires.
But instead of playing him centrally, the Chelsea manager deployed the energetic Brazilian on the right side and it seemed to reduce the number of chances City created from the left flank. Of the 10 chances City created during the 90 minutes, only one Aleksandar Kolarov cross came from the left touchline with three coming from the other side where Pablo Zabaleta and James Milner played wider.
All stats are courtesy of statistics website Squawka. Learn more about Squawka and the free app by clicking here.
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