Grealish may have flopped City audition – but future still bright
Guardiola hails Villa’s ‘incredible player’ after 3-0 defeat, by Jim White at the Etihad Stadium
As auditions go, Saturday’s did not go entirely to plan for Jack Grealish. The Aston Villa captain has long been touted as a Pep Guardiola type of player, the sort the Spaniard likes to build his sides around. Quick, brave, adept on the ball – he has all the qualities embraced by the manager’s championship-winning sides over the years. Saturday was the first time Guardiola had ever managed a team against Villa. What better time to show him what he was missing?
Sadly, on a difficult afternoon when Villa were overwhelmed by a potent combination of Raheem Sterling’s steely will and the video assistant referee, losing 3-0, there was little opportunity for Grealish to demonstrate that he belongs in such company.
Talked up during the week by Alan Hudson as the best English midfielder in the Premier League, watched last weekend by England manager Gareth Southgate, Grealish arrived at the Etihad with more than just eulogies to his name. There is serious statistical evidence to back his growing reputation. This season he is the most fouled player in the division, indicating many opponents are obliged to kick him to prevent his incursions. And he has created the second highest number of scoring opportunities behind City’s Kevin De Bruyne.
Yet there is one number against his name which is more telling: his age. He is 24. He is not 19 like City’s Phil Foden, who delivered a delightful cameo when he came on as a second-half substitute. He is the same age as Sterling, who already has 55 international caps, while Grealish is still spoken of as one for the future.
Indeed, much of the discussion about the Villa man has been around what sort of player he might now be had he come under Guardiola’s direction. Sterling and Foden have benefited hugely from the Spaniard’s intense, driven, unsparing tuition. These are players who have moved from the periphery to the centre. But Grealish, through a loyalty to Villa that Guardiola himself spoke about after the game with admiration, stayed with his boyhood club even when they sank into the Championship, his progress slowed by pitting his considerable wits against less elevated opponents. It would be wrong to suggest Grealish has not kicked on at Villa. He has benefited from the attentions of Dean Smith and John Terry, who both encourage him to be himself.
Terry spent several minutes during the warm-up talking to him. And he has self-evidently improved this season in the Premier League. A player of ambition and nerve, he has risen to the challenge with aplomb, several times making the difference for his team. But what was clear on Saturday was he was not yet ready to dominate a game against a side as accomplished as City. Or even to make much of a mark on it.
In part that was because of the way he was deployed. Rather than positioned centrally to play off Wesley as he has for much of this season, he was stationed on the left of midfield. He did his best, twice running ambitiously with the ball deep into City territory, and was always willing to get stuck in.
He was, however, like the 50,000 people in the stadium, no more than a spectator to the real dominating performance of this game. His contemporary, Sterling, now routinely determines the direction of matches. And here he seized the initiative, driving City forward and lifting them out of a first-half lethargy so profound Guardiola described it as “relegation” form. He took personal control of the game in a way Grealish was never able to, scoring the opener and constantly harrying the visitors’ defence.
Still, there was one observer impressed by him.
“Incredible player, top player,” Guardiola said when asked to assess the visiting captain. “He was so fast in the final third, always he creates something.” The City manager then paused for a beat and grinned. “But too expensive for Manchester City.”