Fabian Delph Is The Player Manchester City Need

Manchester City have succeeded with their second attempt to acquire Aston Villa’s Fabian Delph. How does the young Englishman find himself on City’s payroll?

We covered half the reason with our piece earlier this week about City’s blockbuster transfer of Raheem Sterling. Due to Premier League and UEFA homegrown quotas, English players like Delph typically come at an absolute premium. His presence on City’s teamsheet alone might make the purported £8 million transfer fee seem like a steal.

The other half comes down Yaya Touré. The Ivorian midfielder turned 32 in May and, though he’s committed to City for at least another season, City seem anxious to prepare themselves for a post-Touré world. David Silva’s brilliance and Sergio Agüero’s goals have played their part, but City’s ascent owes a tremendous debt to Touré’s unrivaled dominance in midfield. His versatility, physicality and overall contribution to the team are not qualities often found available on the transfer market. Finding another player to bear the weight City place on Touré’s shoulders is set to be no mean feat.

More from Manchester City

For at least the past two seasons, the obvious candidate to replace Touré has been Juventus’ Paul Pogba. The French international possesses many of the same outstanding qualities as Touré while also being ten years younger. He was never going to come to City easily, though. Pellegrini and company faced competition from most of the major clubs in Europe, Barcelona in particular. What’s more, Juventus seem more eager than ever to hold on to their prize after Arturo Vidal’s sale to Bayern Munich Thursday.

The £49 million move to attain the Sterling’s services might just be a subtle concession on City’s part. They’d have to spend considerably more than that to secure Pogba in all likelihood. Unless they plan on selling one of their current players – or flaunting UEFA’s Financial Fair Play rules – they appear to have moved on from Touré’s ideal successor.

How, then, did Delph find himself second in line to a player like Pogba?

Let’s look at the Delph’s numbers compared to Touré’s and Pogba’s from last season. All numbers borrowed from WhoScored. Bolded figures represent the best of the three players.

	Yaya Touré	Fabian Delph	Paul Pogba
Minutes	2357	2434	2110
Goals	10	–	8
Assists	1	3	4
Shots PG	3.1	1.5	2.2
Passes PG	83.1	59.8	46.6
Pass Accuracy	88.9%	85.2%	83.8%
Key Passes PG	1.1	1.3	1.4
Dispossessed PG	1.3	1.6	2.7
Poor Touches PG	0.8	1.1	1.8
Fouled PG	0.6	1.6	1.4

Tackles PG	1	2.1	2.2
Interceptions PG	0.5	1.4	0.7
Aerials Won PG	1.3	0.7	1.4
Fouls PG	1.1	0.5	2.3

It’s clear even from a cursory glance that Touré’s offensive contribution tops this comparison. He’s more keen on a shot – and thus a goal – and less inclined to provide a key pass to one of his teammates than either Delph or Pogba. That much could have been inferred from simply watching Touré; his powerful runs from deep onto goal have become part of City’s trademark style.

Pogba, immensely talented as he is, would likely have no issue folding into this role for City. By his very nature though he’s a more ‘complete’ player than Touré, equally as eager to provide set up passes to his teammates as he is to track back and contribute out of possession. It’s easy to see why a club like Barcelona might be enthusiastic to acquire him. At only 22 he’s putting up numbers and performances that rival bonafide veterans of the sport.

It’s harder to fathom how Delph might have fallen on City’s radar. Prior to this season, his career with Aston Villa had mostly been consigned to the bench as he suffered multiple, lengthy injury spells. He managed to stay healthy this past season, but his numbers above don’t differ all that dramatically from Tottenham’s Ryan Mason. They’re both 24, English and play similarly well-rounded games.

Yet while Mason was often criticized, Delph was praised and rewarded. He earned his first England cap at the beginning of the season, and was awarded for his efforts with an undoubtedly stacked contract with Manchester City at the end of it. What makes Delph stand out from his peers?

The answer, of course, is that these numbers above were not produced in a vacuum. Touré and Pogba, and to lesser extent Mason, can claim to play with some of the best players in Europe. Their talents are thus magnified in proportion to the quality that surrounds them.

More from Playing for 90

Delph, in contrast, was lucky to avoid relegation with Aston Villa. They finished 17th, three points above the drop. He suffered under half a season of Paul Lambert’s stagnation and then kowtowed to Tim Sherwood’s insistence that every goal go through Christian Benteke in the second half. Delph has managed to put up numbers that, while not quite at the level of the other two players, are inarguably impressive given their context.

City can therefore expect such results from Delph at an absolute minimum. With the likes of Silva, Agüero and Nasri ahead of him he should earn much better returns from his relatively high number of key passes per game. Even his shots per game suggest he should be capable of putting up a decent goal tally. If City can provide him the same space so often afforded to Touré, he might impress in ways we can’t yet anticipate.

There are some other notable difference between Delph and Pogba here though. They come down to two key areas: discipline and control. Pogba plays in Italy’s Serie A, a league known more for technique than physicality. That’s a trend that bears out in the stats: the average Premier League team records more tackles per game than their Italian counterparts and yet tallies fewer fouls. That suggests both a playing style and a culture in Italy that discourages a hard challenge.

Pogba still managed to put up a good tackle rate, but earned himself a higher foul rate as a result. Delph has the advantage of playing a less whistle-happy football culture, but he still managed to avoid fouling opponents at an impressive rate while also drawing a good number of fouls himself. Either quality is important; a player in possession of both is invaluable.

Perhaps more telling is Pogba’s relatively dismal rate of dispossession and poor control. Presumably, the Frenchman is not subject to the same level of pressure and crunching challenges in Italy as he would be in England. It’s easy to imagine a player lacking close control suffering against English teams week in and week out.

In this respect, Delph more closely resembles Touré than Pogba does. While still not impressive figures compared to similar players, they’re still more indicative of a skillset that should thrive on a team like City.

It might be a while yet before we have a chance to see how Delph can contribute to City however. If Touré continues to merit a starting position, it would be hard to imagine Delph finding minutes. There’s a significant risk that, without playing time, he fails to impress enough that City move on from him next summer. It would be tragedy not without precedent for City. Delph is too talented to deserve that fate.