Guardiola set to move for unsettled Spurs star
CITY have been encouraged that a move for Kyle Walker will be successful this summer after cooling their interest 12 months ago.
The England right-back was one of three Tottenham players monitored by Pep Guardiola this season, with a view to a summer move.
The City manager declared last week that he would not pursue Dele Alli, in what would be a world record bid, while Danny Rose may also be out of his reach.
But Tottenham look increasingly vulnerable to losing Walker, with the defender said to be unhappy about being dropped for key games against Chelsea and Arsenal in recent weeks.
Guardiola has told director of football Txiki Begiristain to focus on home-grown targets in a summer when City are expected to spend in the region of £200m.
The Catalan has been open about his admiration for Tottenham’s English-born core of players that are pushing Chelsea so hard for the Premier League title.
But given Spurs chairman Daniel Levy’s reputation as a fierce negotiator, it was always felt that prising just one player away from White Hart Lane would be considered a success.
Mauricio Pochettino has a ready-made replacement for Walker in Kieran Trippier, who has been the preferred option on the right for the FA Cup semifinal and the last North London derby at the Lane against Arsenal on Sunday. SERGIO Aguero believes he CAN play with Gabriel Jesus … by reverting to his old position of second striker.
And if he can convince Pep Guardiola, it could head off the dilemma of whether he will want to leave City in the summer.
The Argentina ace played a more withdrawn role, behind Jesus, as the Blues flopped to a 2-2 draw at Middlesbrough.
But the downside is that Pep Guardiola believes that if he plays Aguero and Jesus, he has to sacrifice his wingers – so Leroy Sane and Raheem Sterling were on the bench at the Riverside Stadium, and the team looked unbalanced and ineffective until they came on as substitutes.
Even though both strikers scored – and Aguero provided the cross for Jesus’ point-saving goal – there was little evidence of the combination working.
Aguero was dropping deep and getting involved in the build-up while Jesus, who looked rusty after ten weeks out injured, was anonymous for most of the game.
Jesus is normally all-action, but if he played his usual game in that line-up he and Aguero could end up tripping over each other.
It is a dilemma that Roberto Mancini and successive Argentina managers faced with Aguero and Carlos Tevez – and which led to Tevez’s benching and subsequent bust-up with Mancini at Bayern Munich.
Both men liked to drop deep and Tevez’s all-action pressing style – very similar to Jesus – meant he often strayed into Aguero’s territory and viceversa.
But Aguero has given everyone a timely reminder that at Atletico Madrid, and often at City, he played that deeper role – so if City can work out a way, he could still play behind Jesus, with Sane and Sterling out wide.
“Every manager has his own style of play,” said Aguero. “Some play 4-4-2, 4-4-1-1, Pep plays 4-3-3.
“At Atletico and Independiente as a youngster, I always played as a second striker.
“During my five-year stint at Atleti I played with another striker. In the first year I played with Fernando Torres, then Diego Forlan and finally Diego Costa.
“When I joined Manchester City, in the first few games I scored a few goals and I enjoyed being in and around the box. I did still drop back.
“Roberto Mancini was in charge and the other forwards were Carlos Tevez, Edin Dzeko and Mario Balotelli. I always played with Dzeko.
“Tevez had had a problem at the club and when he came back, we started playing together. I also played with Balotelli quite a lot. I was always alongside someone else up front.”
For now it is academic, with Aguero possibly out for the season, as he prepares for a scan.
And the fact that David Silva had been in great form until his injury, meant that Aguero’s chances of getting that spot were slim anyway. But Kevin de Bruyne, on recent form, would perhaps be worth sacrificing in order to jam Aguero, Jesus, Sterling and Sane into the same team – with Silva or Ilkay Gundogan, when fit, in the deeper role. Aguero says he ended up as City’s main striker almost by default, with Tevez, Dzeko, and Balotelli all falling by the wayside and no replacement bought until Jesus came along.
“I knew I needed to be in and around the box and I started to enjoy being closer to the penalty area,” he said. “When you score goals, you always enjoy it. People don’t know, they think that I’m a number nine, but I think I’ve only become a number nine over the last two-and-a-half years at City.
“Manuel Pellegrini often played me as a lone striker and it’s been the same under Pep. I’ve been adapting to it over the last two-and-a-half years. Maybe people look at my goals and say, ‘What a number nine!’” Sergio Aguero