New Man City 'weapon' threatens to upset Premier League defences

Manchester City too often became predictable in attack last season but steps are being taken to address that

Manchester City celebrate at Wolves

A new weapon is how Pep Guardiola described it after Manchester City's win over Wolves. And, to be fair, he could have been talking about a number of things.

Oscar Bobb returned to the level of performance he had been threatening last summer before injury cruelly wiped out most of the season, James Trafford put in the kind of calm, shot-stopping performance that Ederson isn't exactly famed for, and Nico Gonzalez ran 12.4km - half a kilometre more than anybody else in the Premier League did.

Instead, Guardiola was specifically referring to the second goal when Bobb stole the ball on the halfway line. Immediately he was flanked by Tijjani Reijnders and Erling Haaland as the trio took up a formation the Mighty Ducks would have been proud of and flew towards the Wolves goal, with Bobb releasing Reijnders to finish first time on his weaker foot.

"We punished them on transitions because we have incredible place with Oscar, Tijjani and Erling," the manager said afterwards. "It’s a weapon that we want to use this season to attack quicker than we did before but for the first game it’s always a little bit how will be the team. It is always a struggle here. I’m really pleased for that."

The opening weekend of the Premier League is ripe for making too much of things, using a sample size of one to try to predict how things will be over 38 games. However, enough has been said and seen from City since the Club World Cup about the need for them to play faster to think that it will be a regular theme of the season.

It was discussed on national radio before the game, with pundit Stephen Warnock talking about how the pace of Jeremy Doku could paradoxically slow City down as defenders raced back to be in position when he got the ball and he then slowed down into his one-on-one. A few days later, Jamie Carragher pointed to the potential impact of new assistant Pep Lijnders to suggest a change to the way City have been playing.

"When you think back to Liverpool and the amount of counter attacking goals with Sadio Mane and Mo Salah - I looked at the goal from Reijnders who was an absolute revelation - and - it was maybe not much like a Pep Guardiola goal," he said. "Of course they've scored plenty of counter attacking goals in the past but the reason it stood out was the counter attacking nature of it and the celebration, Lijnders and Guardiola, he's giving him the thanks hug.

"We don't know exactly what it's for but I don't think it's a coincidence, he as a coach is having a big influence on Pep Guardiola."

City scored 72 league goals last season and three of them - a ratio of one in every 24 goals scored - were classed as counter-attacks. Only Brighton and Leicester managed fewer.

It surely won't stay as high as the one in four that it currently sits at this season, but there is enough evidence to indicate that the ratio should be considerably lower than last season as City give their attack a new dimension.

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