Manchester City: Analyzing David Silva’s Recent Form

A combination of factors are making it harder for David Silva to excel.

There appear to be two reasons for David Silva’s struggles at Manchester City this season. Let’s summarize them here.

Part of it is tactical, particularly in recent games. Silva has played in a much more advanced position recently than he did earlier in the year.

With Kevin De Bruyne starting, Silva is much more often kept up front just behind the wingers or the striker in order to help create space for them to run in behind. Because of how compact teams play against City, Guardiola has preferred to keep Silva in a more advanced role towards the sides of the pitch so City can stretch opposing defenses.

Earlier in the year, when he was playing with Bernardo, they were alternating this role during games. Now, Silva is left in the advanced position much more often. This makes it harder for him to get as involved in the game because he’s much further away from the ball when City are moving from the middle third of the pitch to the final third in their build-up.

Given how often City have the ball in the middle third of the pitch, it’s no surprise that Silva’s passing totals have dropped when he’s been in a more advanced role. You can see this reflected in his pass attempts, particularly in the Spurs ties in the UCL.

Another factor appears to be fatigue.

David Silva has been a consistent starter for Manchester City for nearly a decade. Given his age,  the amount of minutes he’s played both this year and in the past, and City’s tactical approach, it shouldn’t be a surprise that he’s beginning to lose his sharpness.

Silva’s had several poor touches on the ball on recently, particularly in the final third. His finishing, which has been streaky at the club level throughout his career, has been very poor of late too. Silva’s often been in great goal scoring positions, but has made a complete shambles of those chances.

His passing has been quite erratic too. Silva’s gone from being one of the most sure-footed players in the world, to misplacing several passes in recent games.

All of this is the hallmark of player suffering from mental and physical fatigue.

If these were just a handful of performances in a season, it would be easy to dismiss. However, David Silva has now experienced two significant dips in form this year, both of which have put Manchester City’s title aspirations in jeopardy.

Whatever the causes of it, Manchester City need David Silva to recover his form quickly. City can ill afford to continue to start him when he’s struggling to find his game as much as he has recently.

There’s no doubt Silva has been one of the greatest players we’ve ever seen at Manchester City. Here’s to hoping he can rekindle that magic once again.