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Jeremy Doku is enjoying his best season at Manchester City and the winger scored a stunning goal against Liverpool at the Etihad on Sunday.
Jeremy Doku's stunning goal against Liverpool might have rocked the Etihad to its foundations on Sunday, but the winger doesn't rate it as his best-ever goal. In fact, he's not even sure it's in the top three.
Doku cut inside Ibrahima Konate and produced a curling 22-yarder that fizzed past Giorgi Mamardashvili and into the corner of the net. It had Pep Guardiola twirling his hands in delight on the touchline, and the big screen replay delivered plenty of oohs and aahs as it was shown from several angles.
It was particularly well-timed, given Guardiola had recently spoken to Doku in training about his body position when shooting, advising him to get over the ball more to impart more power into the shot. It worked on Sunday and when Doku was withdrawn to a standing ovation, Guardiola wrapped his arms around him and joked about the advice working.
But Doku was quick to shoot down the idea that this was the best goal he had scored. The 23-year-old now has 17 for City and so although there isn't a lot of competition, this screamer isn't at the top of his list.
He rates goals against Luton Town, Fulham and Napoli higher, and the one thing they have in common is that there was more dribbling involved. That probably shouldn't be a surprise from a player whose game is built on running past defenders.
He is starting to deliver more end product this season with three goals and four assists in 16 games, but Guardiola said on Sunday he didn't think Doku would ever get to the point where he was a regular goalscorer and the player himself isn't one to set targets in the final third.
"No, I don’t do that, because I think those come from themselves," he said. "I just work to have more of that but I’m not a player that’s going to look after a game and say ‘you didn’t score, you didn’t assist, you had a bad game’. I’m not that type of player.
"A bad game is for me if I don’t touch the ball, if I’m not effective or if I lose a lot of balls, that’s a bad game. If I didn’t score today, would I have said this is a bad game? No, I would have said this is a good game. That’s how I am and how I’m going to be."
Whatever the numbers say, Doku is delivering more and more impactful performances this season and it certainly feels like his game has gone up a level this term.
For two weeks in a row, he has dovetailed with Phil Foden and Rayan Cherki behind Erling Haaland, with the trio staying close to each other, and Doku believes all three have "a lot of street in us", which is helping the connection.
He also insists he has more room to grow still and when listing the areas for development, there is the clear potential for the Belgian to develop into one of the world's best wingers.
"I’m 23 years old, I hope this is not my peak level," he said. "I hope I can still improve, I improve my finishing, improve my movements in the box, improve my decision making, improve on my awareness when I have the ball. A lot.
"This is an unfinished product and I hope with these teammates and a very good coach like Pep I can still improve of course."
City's convincing win against Liverpool marked them out as Arsenal's likely title rivals this season and closed the gap at the top to four points after the Gunners could only draw with Sunderland.
Doku insists the Blues are only focusing on themselves at this stage of the campaign, but he knows if City hit top gear, it will be difficult for anyone to live with them.
"We have been building and we know that we can still improve," he said. "The performance that we delivered we're very happy with, but we still have to improve every game.
"We're not really looking at Arsenal. What the other teams are doing, because at the end of the day, we know that it depends only on us. And we know that if we are playing well, it's difficult to stand next to us. That's what we did today and we're happy with them."
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