Manchester City attempted 683 passes in their 1-1 draw with Everton, but it was the one that Nathan Ake rejected that exposed the tensions between them.
It came just as another flurry from Pep Guardiola’s side began to take hold. A familiar feeling of exasperation was already brewing in the stands – fans were reflecting on Iliman Ndiaye’s sensational equalizer, which came from Everton’s first touch in the City box – but after a strong start to the second half, there including a rare missed penalty from Erling Haaland, adrenaline and indignation began to take over.
There was a roar as City regained possession deep in their own half, with fans urging the team to continue as Ake advanced while Josko Gvardiol made a career on the left flank. But as the Dutchman turned around to find Bernardo Silva In midfield, to a collective groan from the home fans, Guardiola burst into the edge of his technical area and called for calm.
Everton found their form – Guardiola still begging his supporters – as a slower attacking move through the middle ultimately failed on the opposite side
It could have become the kind of radical move that City have struggled to contain throughout their growing winless streak – no team has conceded more than their 5.3 expected goals (xG) during quick breaks in the match. Premier League this season – but that only highlighted their aversion to exploiting such situations themselves.
Gvardiol rushed Jack Harrisonand clearly had the momentum to leap by the 36-year-old Seamus Coleman at the back, but this time Guardiola’s insistence on controlled construction trumped common sense. City had enough manpower to deal with any loss of possession and an oncoming counterattack, and given their current problems controlling such situations, even if they are in the desired defensive shape, they should surely have taken their chances.
Of course, it was just an individual decision in a game of millions. But with City once again looking more threatening when picking up the pace and being more aggressive in their movement, it begs the question of whether Guardiola’s side should accept a little more of the disorganization of a direct forward run .
Despite long periods of safe attacking play, City were not completely averse to taking risks in their approach. Particularly in the first 15 minutes, they looked desperate to score the first goal, aware that their opponents had racked up consecutive clean sheets against Arsenal And Chelseaand were able to turn this into a 90 minute job.
City usually call on one of their full-backs in midfield to help with their build-up, but it was visible how hard they pushed both Rico Lewis and Gvardiol high and wide as they came out of the blocks, looking to overload Everton’s back four and spread them across the pitch.
As we can see from the catch below, with Lewis cut out from the shot down the right, the approach was virtually a 3-0-7 as City piled on the pressure in the early stages.
However, after Silva scored the opening goal, Lewis quickly returned to his more central role to provide more control in the build-up and make City more compact when losing possession.
There he is three minutes after the goal, two steps from Mateo Kovacic in midfield.
It was a conscious decision by Guardiola to take the advantage out of the game and return to more stable form, and it might have been justified had Ndiaye not produced a moment of genius on the break. But with City so susceptible to punches at the moment, it was a missed opportunity to see them take their foot off the gas so early.
One of the side effects of Lewis returning to midfield is that his winger… Savinho yesterday – loses support on the flank. The Brazilian made 15 touches in the quarter hour before City’s goal, but just 16 during the rest of the half.
SkillCorner’s data helps paint the picture: City are the team in Europe’s big five leagues with the fewest overlapping runs per 30 minutes of possession. They also attempted the fewest passes to find a runner behind compared to their possession, taking about 46 percent of their chances to find those runs when they were made. Unsurprisingly, this is the lowest proportion in the Premier League this season.
There are several factors influencing these numbers – the fact that City tend to play teams who sit deep and deny them space at the back by being one – but the lack of movement from advanced players as the team advance has become increasingly evident in recent weeks. It makes things predictable, as was the case for Aston Villaand only increases the difficulty of finding players in congested, mostly static central areas with their backs to goal.
There was an encouraging example of positional rotation during their 3-0 win against Nottingham Forest at the beginning of the month, like Jack Grealish dragged a defender into midfield to allow Gvardiol to sneak in for a shot on goal, but City appear reluctant to make such disruptive advances as often as they can.
A gloomy way of looking at it is that points lost don’t matter so much now that City are so far from the top. The damage – from a title race perspective, if not maybe Champions League qualification — has already been done.
But starting a three-game winnable run with another setback feels like a missed opportunity for the team to rebuild confidence in front of goal. Had City been more ruthless in their approach and opted for the sort of passes denied by Ake, their firepower could have countered some of the bad luck.
(Top photo: Carl Recine/Getty Images)