De Bruyne is more complete than both Pogba and Eden
The Belgian is the most complete player in the league, ahead of Paul Pogba and Eden Hazard, but must prove it consistently Kevin de Bruyne is the most complete player in the Premier League. He has everything you would want from a modern midfielder, even more so than Paul Pogba, and the £55m Manchester City paid for him is cheap in today’s market. Players that good do not show up too often.
But De Bruyne turned 26 on Wednesday and it is reasonable to ask whether this coming season, his third in Manchester, will be when we finally see the very best of the man Pep Guar- diola wants to build his team around.
Because there is still a nagging sense with De Bruyne that he has not yet produced the complete top-level season that he is capable of. In his first season under Manuel Pellegrini, De Bruyne did well enough in flashes in an under-performing team but not consistently. He missed more than two months with a knee injury sustained in January 2016.
Yes, De Bruyne scored a brilliant winner against Paris Saint Germain to get City into the semi-finals of the Champions League. No Manchester City player had ever won a Champions League quarter-final second leg for them before, it must be said. But no City player had cost £55m either. De Bruyne comes with his own fresh standards.
It was only when Guardiola replaced Pellegrini that De Bruyne could fairly be judged. It was the prospect of working with Guardiola, after all, that helped encourage De Bruyne to pick City in 2015. Guardiola started with De Bruyne in the middle of a 4-3-3 system, alongside David Silva, trying to take advantage of the two best football brains around.
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