It’s the business end of the season: this is where the wheat separates from the chaff and the title challengers really establish their credentials.
It was during this period last year that Manchester City asserted their dominance and the signs are that it will continue this time around.
The name on everyone’s lips is Bernardo Silva (£7.5m). He has notched five goals over the last six Gameweeks and now has over 20% ownership. This is already his best-ever campaign in terms of goals (seven), having notched just two last year and six the year before.
It is interesting to note that he has registered just two assists so far, an area he seemed to do better in previous years with 14 in the last two seasons.
Is it the case of a new role for the Portuguese or is it just a player bang in form? There is no doubt his footballing ability, but is he finally “Fantasy Friendly”? In this article, I delve into the Man. City numbers to see what’s going on.
First, let’s look at the last six Gameweeks:
Only three Man City players have played every minute of the last six league matches – Bernardo, Rodri (£5.5m) and Ederson (£6.0m). The first two have been left out of their Champions League game against Leipzig so that tells you all you need to know about Bernardo’s place in Pep’s pecking order at the minute. He is the most likely of all City midfielders to play minutes in the busy Christmas period, in my opinion. In fact, he has started every match since Gameweek 4. So in terms of expected minutes, Bernardo is your man.
Now let’s look at expected goal involvement (xGI) over the last six Gameweeks:
Ilkay Gundogan (£7.3m) leads the way amongst the midfielders for xGI (2.74) and shots in the box (10) with Bernardo close behind (2.31 & nine). Bernardo has played 203 minutes more, though, and if you look at the xG, Gundogan wins with 2.21 to Bernardo’s 1.72. So this would indicate that Bernardo’s average xG for each shot in the box is less than 0.20. So in terms of quality of chances, Gundogan perhaps has the edge. There can be no denying from these numbers that Bernardo has significantly overperformed his xG but his numbers are still good enough to indicate a good future output of points.
Phil Foden’s (£8.1m) xG is worryingly low, just 0.73. Limited minutes (313) are obviously a caveat but he’s played about the same number as Gundogan (337) and Sterling (369). His 1.32 expected assists (xA) is top though and if he gets moved to a central role with Jack Grealish (£7.6m) wider, then that would up his goal threat considerably too.
There has been some talk about how Guardiola has been using the wingers in more of a creative role to provide the width and seeing Raheem Sterling (£10.6m) top for chances created (13) would indicate that being true.
Now, let’s compare this with the six-Gameweek period prior to that (Gameweeks 4-9):
