Everton 0-2 Manchester City Review

Premier League GW33

This was a performance far from the creative best we’ve seen in patches from the team this season, but it was in line with what we’ve come to expect from Guardiola away from home in 2025. Give the opposition nothing, control the transitions, and roll the dice late. It’s not worked in other games, but it came off against Everton with an important win.

MOTM: NICO O’REILLY

Notable Stats:

• Aged 20 years and 29 days, Nico O'Reilly is the fourth-youngest player to score in back-to-back Premier League appearances for Manchester City, and youngest since Phil Foden in June 2020 (20y 25d).

• Against Everton, Omar Marmoush (6) and Ilkay Gundogan (6) had the joint most shot sequence involvements, Ruben Dias (15) made the most progressive passes, Matheus Nunes (7) made the most progressive carries, and Nico O'Reilly (7) made the most ball recoveries for Manchester City.

• As a back four, O'Reilly-Gvardiol-Dias-Nunes has kept three clean sheets in the three matches they've all started together.

Game Stats:

Everton 0-2 Manchester City

• xG: 0.8 - 2.0

• xThreat: 1.17 - 1.7

• Possession: 33.3% - 66.7%

• Field Tilt: 30.5% - 69.5%

• Penalty Box Shots: 7 - 6

• Deep Entries: 11 - 17

• PPDA: 15.9 - 9.9

• High Turnovers: 1 - 2

Remained relatively stable for several games now, although xGA is creeping slowly down.

Manchester City are now unbeaten in their last six matches across all competitions, the second-longest unbeaten streak for the team this season. Omar Marmoush (1,047) has passed 1,000 minutes for Manchester City this season. Ruben Dias and Josko Gvardiol have both started the last seven matches. Josko Gvardiol (3,883) is on track to play more minutes this season than Rodri (4,327) managed across the entire 23/24 season. Matheus Nunes has now completed 20 full 90s. That's as many as Jack Grealish, James McAtee, and Jeremy Doku combined.

If you want to stay up-to-date on individual player minutes, back four combinations, underlying numbers, and more, check out the live Google sheet below. 👇

Here is how both teams lined up for the match, and the choice of Bernardo Silva at right wing gave everyone an indication right away that this match would be like previous ones away from home. Control the transition, limit the opposition, retain the ball, and open up the game on your terms. Not that it makes for great viewing in the first half.

What Guardiola didn’t get was a team being creative in the final third, taking a lot of risks, driving into the box, and having plenty of shots. At least for the first half, the approach of limiting Everton in the first half from having any real dangerous transitions despite the physicality (Doucoure) they have in the front line, and how good Ndiaye is at carrying the ball into space. But that wouldn’t have been the entire plan, so from one angle, yes, the team delivered. After the match, Guardiola mentioned that he didn’t change much from the first to the second half, and the players just played better.

Jeremy Doku came on towards the end of the second half (78’) along with Mateo Kovacic. He did very well to ride challenges, made O'Brien run, and could handle his strength. Touch always into space and just outside the defender's reach. Couple nice runs off the ball. Good work in the lead-up to the second goal, finding Gundogan inside the box. Gave the team a real drive in the final third to finish the game. which they’d end up winning, and puts himself in a good position to start against Aston Villa on Tuesday.

N. O'Reilly 84' 0-1 

In his last six starts for Manchester City, O'Reilly has scored two goals against Plymouth, taking them into the next round, two assists against Bournemouth, taking them to Wembley, and provided a crucial goal in picking up three points against Everton. Bernardo holds onto the ball, doesn't force the pass into the first run Nunes made, instead waits for him to come back and make the overlapping run, weighting it for him to cross first time. O'Reilly makes a good movement behind the Everton CB before coming around the back of him to attack the cross into the box.

M. Kovacic 90'+2 0-2

The pass back to Dias is a little short, so he jumps and switches it across to Jeremy Doku, who is briefly in a 2v2 as the Everton players are rushing over to cover. He can’t play this pass over to Doku playing as the LCB, another benefit of moving Gvardiol there.

Marmoush holds his position in the position, Doku plays the pass through into Gundogan for a brilliant turn and lay off for Mateo Kovacic. Sliding into the D to score into the bottom left corner. Five out of six PL goals he's scored this season have been in the bottom left corner.

In the first half, Manchester City only had three box entries. Bernardo (2) and Marmoush (1) contributed. In the second, they had ten box entries, seven coming from the left-hand side. Gundogan (3), De Bruyne (2), Doku (2), Marmoush (2), and Bernardo (1) all contributed. The pass from Bernardo into the box for Nunes to cross is then tapped in by Nico O'Reilly. Jeremy Doku passes into Ilkay Gundogan inside the box, he turns and lays it off for Mateo Kovacic to score.

Manuel Akanji came on right at the end of the match (88’) for a few minutes. Great to have him back in training and eventually to be available to start. Especially when we’re looking at some games to either rotate at CB or needing someone more defensively strong playing at RB.

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Moving Forward

One of the impacts of the shift to LCB that's been great to see, especially with Guardiola now keeping only two CBs in the first line, is the emphasis it puts on Gvardiol to pass more. O'Reilly and Savinho can carry the ball as much as is needed to progress down the left. Against Everton, when it comes to moving the opposition block, we saw some good switches out to the right wing, as well as that he can quickly receive from Dias/Nunes and move it across to O'Reilly/Savinho, being left-footed.

On Kevin De Bruyne Not Extending

Appreciate that there is a lot of emotion, rightly, in the De Bruyne decision not to extend, and a lot of information we don't have, but it does give me some confidence that they'll make better decisions in the long run. Unfortunately, you can't have it both ways when it comes to extending aging players of his quality. Mixed reports on whether he'd take a reduced wage contract, so nobody knows for certain, and I don't see why he would take that if elsewhere (Saudi/MLS) he can get those wages in the final years.

I don't think it's worth comparing to Bernardo, Gundogan, Kovacic, and so on until you see the outcome in the summer. Who stays and goes. De Bruyne is in a position where, as a starter, his physicality is crucial to his game, and we've seen more than enough matches this season to doubt that next season. As a rotation option, it then shifts to whether it's worth blocking the pathway of younger players, and preventing minutes from going to others who play centrally.

Hopefully, it's Champions League finish and winning the FA Cup to finish off his career at the club on a good note. Not everyone gets a perfect ending. Understand it's a divisive topic for City fans.

Of late, Matheus Nunes has improved when playing at right-back and begun to tidy up mistakes. The role allows him to carry the ball, cross, and make forward runs frequently, all part of his strengths. His 10/15 Premier League starts have come from full-back. If he wanted to, I think right-back is an option for him, at least as the second/rotational option that’s picking up 2,000+ minutes a season. Do you agree?

Initially, I thought that as a replacement for De Bruyne, as a creative force in the team, Gibbs-White is behind other candidates available. Wirtz is one of them. I used to be skeptical of the signing. However, as I explore in this thread below, if we are viewing Morgan Gibbs-White as a number eight, as a midfielder, then I think his other qualities, combined with what he's able to do creatively, make him a great fit for the team heading into its rebuild.

Seen people make the comparison between Grealish and Gibbs-White, should the latter make the move, not being able to carry the ball like at their former club. From what I've seen of the two, Grealish at Villa is dropping deep to collect the ball, then looks to see the space he can carry into centrally. Figure out the pass later. Gibbs-White will seek space centrally and wide, scan for the open space/opposition player, then take his first touch into that, and get himself in front of the opposition player. Then has the burst to attack that space, carry the ball, and try to open up the passing angle for a teammate. He's far more of a passer than people make him out to be.

Next up for Manchester City is Aston Villa this evening in what will be a huge match for either side to win. Moving Villa into the Champions League spot or pushing City towards a 3rd place finish. A match they cannot afford to lose, and Villa must win.