Aguero’s consistent FPL returns at the Etihad continue in derby win

Our Scout Notes from Gameweek 12 conclude with a look back at the Manchester derby and Wolves’ excellent performance in their 1-1 draw with Arsenal.

All-but-one of Sergio Aguero‘s 14 goal involvements in 2018/19 have come at the Etihad, with the Argentinean striker on target again at Eastlands in a satisfying victory for Pep Guardiola’s side over their cross-city rivals.

Wolves’ run of hard-luck stories continued at the Emirates, meanwhile, with Nuno Espirito Santo’s side just five minutes away from all three points before a late equaliser from the Gunners.

Raul Jimenez delivered another attacking return for his large Fantasy following, while there was plenty to be encouraged by for those FPL bosses who own a Wolves asset ahead of an appealing Gameweek 13 match against Huddersfield Town.

Manchester City 3-1 Manchester United

• Goals: David Silva (£8.5m), Sergio Aguero (£11.4m), Ilkay Gundogan (£5.4m | Anthony Martial (£7.6m)
• Assists: Bernardo Silva (£7.5m) x2, Riyad Mahrez (£8.6m) | Romelu Lukaku (£10.7m)

Sergio Aguero (£11.4m) delivered an attacking return for the seventh straight home league match as the Manchester City forward became the outright leading Premier League goalscorer of 2018/19 with his eighth strike of the season.

Much has been made of Aguero’s inability to deliver mammoth points hauls (two double-digit scores in 12 appearances) and regular attacking returns on the road but his consistency in home fixtures – matches, perhaps, in which he is most likely to be handed the captaincy by Fantasy managers – is an underrated quality.

The Argentinean forward’s goal just after half-time was brilliantly taken after a one-two with Riyad Mahrez (£8.6m) and Aguero kept the United backline occupied for most of his 75 minutes on the pitch, even if he wasn’t to register another shot on target in the match as Jose Mourinho’s side attempted – with some success after the opening goal – to smother their hosts.

Pep Guardiola spoke of his side’s first-half toiling after the game:

The first half was not so good, we played like, ‘I don’t want to lose the ball’ but not with the intention to attack. I felt when I watched my players a team that felt the pressure. We were stable, we scored one goal, the first 15 minutes was good and after that we didn’t press so well.

The second half we started better, we change the way we pressed [the United centre-halves Victor] Lindelof and [Chris] Smalling.

We spoke at half-time that we could play better and we were much better with the goal after five minutes. It is difficult, they defended so deep, they are aggressive, they follow man to man. After 2-1, we reacted well, we don’t concede chances and step by step we regained our game.

There has been much talk in recent weeks of ditching Aguero for Raheem Sterling (£11.2m), though almost inevitably the England winger was to blank following his 21-point haul against Southampton the previous weekend.

There was still plenty to encourage Sterling’s owners, however, even if the City midfielder saw all three of his attempts on goal blocked by last-ditch United challenges.

Sterling, deployed on the left flank in this match as City welcomed back Mahrez on the opposite wing, registered five more penalty box touches than the next most-involved player in the Manchester derby and looked a threat every time he went forward, even if some of his decision-making in those dangerous positions was perhaps below the usual standard.

Twice Chris Smalling (£5.7m) managed to shackle the ball behind when Sterling looked poised to pull the trigger.

Sterling indeed played a key part in City’s opening goal, though sadly for his owners only “assisted the assister” in the move that led up to David Silva‘s (£8.5m) strike.

Guardiola was seen to berate Sterling for showboating at full-time, though downplayed the scolding in his post-match presser:

He made some movements with the legs, we can avoid it, but he is young, he can improve. But I like a lot how he played.

David Silva scored for the third time in a week and he, Fernandinho (£5.4m) and Bernardo Silva (£7.5m) utterly dominated United’s defensive-minded midfield trio of Nemanja Matic (£5.0m), Marouane Fellaini (£4.9m) and Ander Herrera (£5.0m), with the Silvas pulling slightly wider than usual and not allowing their United counterparts to suffocate their creativity.

This was nothing new, of course: Silva and Bernardo have been two of City’s most impressive performers this campaign.

To borrow a line from City Watch, though, the pair have played exceptionally well this season without registering the same eye-catching attacking statistics that Sterling and Aguero have been posting to back their performances up.

It’s all relative, of course: Bernardo and Silva have now each been directly involved in six of City’s league goals this season, while no FPL midfielder has recorded more key passes than “El Mago” in 2018/19.

It was Bernardo’s turn to be the creator on Sunday, with the Portuguese international carving out more chances than any other FPL player in Gameweek 12.

After supplying the first goal for Silva to sweep home, Bernardo then capped off City’s victory with another assist for the fit-again Ilkay Gundogan (£5.4m) on 85 minutes.

For the second match in a row, owners of Manchester City’s defensive assets were denied a clean sheet when Ederson (£5.8m) brought down an opposing attacker in the box and could then do nothing to prevent the subsequent spot-kick from being converted.

Benjamin Mendy (£6.4m), although fairly prominent in the final third and fizzing over half a dozen (unsuccessful) crosses, didn’t register a single key pass or shot on goal and blanked for the second week in a row.

His owners were dealt another blow on Monday when he pulled out of the France national team squad with a knee sprain and lesion, though further news is awaited on the severity of the City defender’s problem.

Mendy wasn’t the only player involved in the Manchester derby to drop out of Les Bleus’ squad yesterday: Anthony Martial (£7.6m), the scorer of United’s “consolation” penalty, was also ruled out with an adductor problem.

Team-mate Paul Pogba (£8.0m), who played no part in the defeat to City because of a thigh injury, won’t be joining up with Didier Deschamps’ squad either.

United were anaemic without Pogba (who was admittedly poor in Turin last Wednesday) to propel their attacks, with two of their front three – Jesse Lingard and Marcus Rashford (both £6.7m) – not registering a single penalty box touch between them.

The introduction of Juan Mata (£6.2m), Alexis Sanchez (£10.0m) and the fit-again Romelu Lukaku (£10.7m) off the bench sparked the slightest of improvements, with Lukaku being felled by Ederson for the penalty that Martial subsequently despatched.

Mourinho spoke of how Pogba’s absence disrupted his game-plan and forced him to play Fellaini for the second time in five days.

There was a fantastic character from the team and a great effort by everybody. [Marouane] Fellaini shouldn’t play for 90 minutes because it was too much for him. He should be on the bench and come on later in the game. But he had to play because of Paul [Pogba]’s absence.

So it was not an easy week for us but I just told the players they’re playing much better than before; we are much stronger, we are much more compact. Now we have to not let the defeat disappoint us. Sad, yes, but not too disappointed. In two weeks’ time we play at home against Crystal Palace and, from that game, we have to try to get the points.

It is not for me, after a defeat, to speak about a player who was not here [Pogba]. Of course, we missed him and one of the things that breaks a little bit, a lot of our plan, is the fact Fellaini had to start. He is not in the conditions to play 90 minutes. He was phenomenal in his effort but not in the conditions. Normally, adding Fellaini to this late part of the game, you have the image of him fresh coming on at 2-1 with 25 minutes to go, it is an important thing for us.

Luke Shaw (£5.0m) picked up his fifth yellow card of the season and will miss the home match against Crystal Palace in a fortnight’s time.

Nicolas Otamendi (£6.1m), who hasn’t featured for Manchester City in the league since Gameweek 7, pulled out of the Argentina squad on Monday with a tendon injury.

Manchester City XI (4-3-3): Ederson; Walker, Stones, Laporte, Mendy; Bernardo, Fernandinho, Silva (Foden 89′); Mahrez (Sane 62′), Aguero (Gundogan 75′), Sterling.

Manchester United XI (4-3-3): De Gea; Young, Smalling, Lindelof, Shaw; Ander Herrera (Mata 73′), Matic, Fellaini; Lingard (Lukaku 57′), Rashford (Sanchez 73′), Martial.

Arsenal 1-1 Wolverhampton Wanderers

• Goals: Henrikh Mkhitaryan (£6.7m) | Ivan Cavaleiro (£5.2m)
• Assists: Aaron Ramsey (£7.4m) | Raul Jimenez (£5.8m)

It has been a frustrating few weeks for owners of Matt Doherty (£4.9m).

Denied an assist in Gameweek 11 after being wrongly flagged for offside and having had six shots on goal without success at Brighton a week earlier, the Irish wing-back came within five minutes of emerging from the Emirates with a clean sheet on Sunday only for a late Henrikh Mkhitaryan (£6.7m) goal to leave him without a return in four matches.

There was plenty of encouragement for owners of Doherty and other Wolves assets, though, ahead of excellent-looking fixtures against Huddersfield Town and Cardiff City after the international break.

That it took until 60 minutes for Rui Patricio (£4.6m) to be called into action said much about Wolves’ rearguard effort, with one remarkable minute of play a quarter of the way through the game representative of the visitors’ overall performance.

Alexandre Lacazette (£9.7m), Granit Xhaka (£5.3m) and Alex Iwobi (£5.5m) were all denied within the space of ten seconds by superb last-ditch blocks from a sea of old gold, before a rapid breakaway led to an excellent – but wasted – chance for Helder Costa (£4.9m) to double his side’s lead.

Wolves were exhilarating on the counter-attack and that spurned opportunity for Costa was just one in a series of chances that the visitors carved out on the break, with Arsenal relying on Bernd Leno (£4.8m) to keep out shots from substitutes Diogo Jota (£5.9m) and Adama Traore (£5.4m).

Another of Nuno Espirito Santo’s second-half replacements, Morgan Gibbs-White (£4.3m), was desperately unfortunate to see his stoppage-time effort crash back off the angle of post and bar.

Wolves’ 12th-minute opener had also come from a swift breakaway, with Granit Xhaka (£5.3m) guilty of dawdling on the ball in midfield and allowing Ivan Cavaleiro (£5.2m) to steal possession – the Wolves winger playing a one-two with Raul Jimenez (£5.8m) before firing past Leno.

Jimenez, like Wolves in general, has been guilty of some wasteful finishing this season. Only three Premier League teams have registered more attempts on goal than Santo’s troops in 2018/19, but 12 clubs have been on the scoresheet with more frequency.

Jimenez meanwhile has spurned seven of his nine big chances and his goal conversion rate is among the lowest in the division among first-choice strikers.

There endeth the arguments against the Mexican target-man, however.

Only Aguero has created more chances than Jimenez among FPL forwards this season, for instance, while only Callum Wilson (£6.8m) can offer Fantasy managers better value-for-money than the Wolves number nine in attack (returning 10.6 points per million spent compared to Jimenez’s 9.8).

Jimenez is also something of a talismanic figure, having been directly involved in eight (three goals, five assists) of Wolves’ 12 league goals in the top flight.

The Mexico international has only failed to deliver an attacking return in two of the last eight Gameweeks, meanwhile, and with two of the bottom three Premier League clubs to face next, there will be no shortage of takers in the short-term.

Doherty, meanwhile, is looking in ominous form for those two upcoming fixtures, having made more key passes than any other player on show at the Emirates and ranking second for touches in the final third among Wolves assets.

Jonny (£4.5m) also caught the eye with an excellent all-round display on the left flank, while anyone watching the match in north London on Sunday will wonder quite how Costa hasn’t delivered a goal or assist this season after he terrorised the Arsenal backline.

Santo paid tribute to his side after full-time:

Coming to the Emirates and playing the way we played, I feel we should be proud. It’s a good point, but of course we could have won. We were organised, solid and brave to put our barriers in front of the ball.

Arsenal are a very good team. We blocked them, we had a lot of balance and cover and didn’t allow them to play so great credit to the boys. When we had the ball we were threatening and created chances.

The way we managed possession and created so many chances, against a very good team in a difficult stadium, is a credit to our players.

Sometimes you are clinical and do it, sometimes not. The defensive organisation is why we stayed in the game until the end. Even after Arsenal scored, it was us who had the chances, we were asking for more time from the referee.

Arsenal, meanwhile, were lucky to escape with a point having failed to really pose a goal threat until the final 20 minutes of the game and having looked abysmal at the back throughout – which should offer plenty of encouragement to owners of Bournemouth’s Fantasy assets ahead of the two clubs’ meeting in Gameweek 13.

No Premier League side, indeed, has conceded more big chances on home soil than the Gunners this season.

That the Gunners’ defence has proved to be sieve-like this season is a disappointment from a Fantasy perspective, as Hector Bellerin (£5.4m) has otherwise looked an attractive FPL option: in the last four Gameweeks, no defender has had more shots on goal than the Spaniard.

Bellerin twice found himself in excellent shooting positions on Sunday, blazing the best of his chances over, while no player on any side registered as many penalty box touches.

Bellerin also created Arsenal’s only “big chance”, which Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang (£10.9m) somehow turned onto the post on 73 minutes.

Aubameyang was again unable to influence the game from the left flank, but Lacazette similarly wasn’t any sort of threat up top either – that one blocked shot we mentioned earlier being his only attempt on goal.

Mesut Ozil (£8.4m) was anonymous as Wolves bossed the midfield, though Iwobi and substitute Mkhitaryan were similarly ineffectual on the flanks – until, of course, the Armenian’s inswinging cross fortuitously found its way past Patricio on 85 minutes.

Iwobi indeed was hooked at the interval, with Unai Emery explaining his decision after full-time:

It was a tactical change. We wanted to play our right and left-backs deeper and win back more possession inside with Sead and Hector. Sometimes we did this situation well and we created chances to score. Their work was good defensively because their block was very high.

Arsenal confirmed on Monday that Danny Welbeck (£6.5m) has undergone a second operation on his ankle, while Lacazette, just hours after being called up by France, withdrew from national team duty with a reported groin injury.

Arsenal XI (4-2-3-1): Leno; Bellerin, Mustafi, Holding, Kolasinac (Mkhitaryan 75′); Torreira, Xhaka; Iwobi (Guendouzi 46′), Ozil (Ramsey 75′), Aubameyang; Lacazette.

Wolves XI (3-4-3): Patricio; Bennett, Coady, Boly; Doherty, Neves, Moutinho, Jonny; Costa (Traore 75′), Jimenez (Gibbs-White 85′), Cavaleiro (Jota 61′).

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