By handing Stoke City their second consecutive 4-0 drubbing, Manchester City, looking rather ravishing and clear-eyed, took third place on the table for themselves, for the moment at least.
Arsenal can take it back if they beat Sunderland – a rather large ‘if’, if you ask Sam Allardyce – but Manchester City’s recent revival has been marked. From early February to mid-March, City won just one league game, losing to Leicester, Spurs, Liverpool and Manchester United. They’re now unbeaten in their last five games.
But this season, ending strongly though it might be, has been a strange one for the Citizens. As Leicester and Spurs have screamed out, dragging every eye with them, clear at the front of the league, City have sort of melted into the background.
When the impending arrival of Pep Guardiola was announced, and when Kevin de Bruyne, their newest sparkling jewel, went down injured, a fog ensconced City, one they almost willingly stumbled into. They’re nine points behind the leaders Leicester, with four games to go. The fact that their spot in the top four seems almost assured shouldn’t really be, for a squad of this strength, congratulated with too much enthusiasm, particularly this season.
It’s quite clear where exactly the point of weakness is, the crumbling pillar responsible for their half-built title challenge. A simple glance at a bespoke league table holds the answer; as far as results against top eight sides are concerned, City sit equal-second from bottom.
I’ll repeat that: only relegated Aston Villa have taken less points (4) from top eight sides this season than City (6). They’re still to play Arsenal at the Emirates, but apart from that their fixtures against the league’s best are over.
When it comes to results against the rest of the league – the bottom 12, if you’ll allow – City are among the most impressive teams in the league, with 58 from a potential 69 points. The phrase “flat-track bullies” comes to mind, and certainly City’s start to the season supports this thought.
They won their first five games, beating West Brom, Chelsea, Everton, Watford and Crystal Palace – all current members of the bottom 12 – City promptly lost their next two games to West Ham and Spurs. They then vanquished Newcastle and Bournemouth 6-1 and 5-1 respectively, only to next draw 0-0 with Manchester United. A galling pattern emerged, and it has lasted most of the season.
A competitive title challenge can only be made on the back of a consistent season. City’s issues in this regard are mirrored exactly by West Ham’s; the Hammers are top of the ‘vs top eight’ table, enjoying a giant-killing campaign, where confidence appears to surge even more freely when the opponent is favoured.
But Slaven Bilic’s team sit in sixth, three points behind Manchester United in fifth. They have, in perfect asymmetry to City, actually struggled against the lesser sides, dropping points to Bournemouth, Newcastle, Swansea and Villa this term.
For West Ham, it may just be a troubling complacency that hinders them so, something that must be scraped from this team. For City, the answer is more convoluted. For team this experienced, containing multiple Premiership winners, as well as players who have earned legitimate silverware at other clubs, to bottle against their direct rivals in this way is puzzling. Even more perplexing is that City have excelled this season in another competition – Europe’s most prized, in fact – a tournament they have notoriously struggled to progress in since they arrived at the apex of the European game: the Champions League.
Next week, City will contest their semi-final against Real Madrid. The English side are expected to lose this tie, but with Madrid occupied with a thrillingly tight title race in Spain, and potentially without a fully-fit Cristiano Ronaldo, City aren’t without a chance. In Sergio Aguero, they have this year’s most prolific EPL striker, and de Bruyne and David Silva are fully fit now. Having underperformed in Europe for a handful of seasons, City might just give Manuel Pellegrini the world’s best going-away gift.
So if this team somehow gathered enough grit and substance to see off Paris Saint Germain – over two legs, no less – then why have they seemed so listless against their elite domestic rivals? Well, it could be a matter of mindset when it comes to the two competitions. The league is a marathon, over mountainous terrain, where crags and crevasses of varying widths must be negotiated. It is wearying, and the constant reminder of the league table, of deficits that must be filled in, only saps the morale further.
The high-stakes, haymaker nature of knockout cup competitions is very different; single victories, even individual goals, can mean all the difference. This City team is flighty, effervescent, easily deflated, easily buoyed. Cup competitions have suited them this season; they’ve already won the League Cup.
Although Bayern Munich enjoy relatively obscene dominance in Germany, the way Guardiola has driven them relentlessly to – assuming they can maintain their current seven-point lead over Dortmund – three straight titles, with a win percentage over that time greater than that which he achieved at Barcelona, it seems safe to assume that Guardiola can reform this season’s failings.
A long-time criticism of this City project is that when you assemble a group of highly-paid, highly-strung footballers so very quickly, an absence of camaraderie can result. This can, in turn, lead to collapse when the going gets tough, when the pressure intensifies. Guardiola, more than any other modern manager, has been able to instil powerful, compelling philosophies into the very souls of his teams. He will need to do the same in Manchester next season.
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