Jack Grealish’s role is a symbol of Manchester City’s offensive confusion.

There was something much darker about the latest news. Manchester Cityof the spate of recent defeats, and that was how inevitable it seemed from the start.

The result is one thing — 2-1 defeat on Saturday against Aston Villa It’s the 11th time City have failed to win in 12 games in all competitions, and it’s the ninth time they’ve been beaten during this run – but it was another down afternoon for the Pep Guardiola’s tired team which followed an all too familiar match. scenario.

It took less than a minute to notice a defensive error from the team that, just a few weeks ago, was chasing its fifth straight game. Premier League title. Josko Gvardiol I’m having trouble sending John Duran The goal scored was City’s 12th mistake leading to a shot in the top flight this season – more than in the entirety of the 2021-22 and 2022-23 seasons. Combined.

There was a deadly pass behind City’s high line for Villa’s opener, a powerful run through a struggling midfield for their second, and even another injury to a centre-back – John Stoneswho had been reinstated too early in the starting lineup after his last dismissal.

But in a game where City’s defensive problems were dreary and predictable, it was their lack of variety up front that shocked the most.

Villa dropped deep and defended resolutely when they needed to, but worrying patterns are starting to develop. Erling Haaland touched the ball once in the opponent’s penalty area (and even that happened in the 89th minute), while Jack Grealish received 16 floated passes down the left flank in the first half alone, a telling sign that City were struggling to play through Unai Emery’s defensive block.

The City team’s firepower can blow away any team and can even mask their defensive cracks. But when they hit a wall – as they did yesterday for the third game in a row – it only makes the problems easier to see.

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One of the brightest aspects of Guardiola’s nearly nine-year spell at City has been the range of attacking schemes they produce in the final third, but the current side are struggling to find flexibility in their traditional 3-2-5 structure when teams deny them a route to the middle.

Against Villa on Saturday, Rico Lewis drifted in from full-back when City had the ball, as always, while one of the deeper midfielders, Ilkay Gundoganpushed to the front line. Phil Foden was the other number 10, while Grealish and Bernardo Silva held the width.

Villa’s plan was to first block passes from City’s back three towards midfield. John McGinn was responsible for going inside from the right and stopping the road towards Mateo Kovacicwhile it was Youri Tielemans’ job to do so when the champions were building on the opposite side.

Further back, Amadou Onana And Boubacar Kamara took care to recover City’s two No. 10s, as shown in the capture below.

City’s passing was not quick enough to find these players between the lines, and although Gundogan and Foden were happy to fail to win the ball back in deeper areas, they offered few runs in behind.

That meant the only option was to find Grealish – almost completely out of frame in the bottom left corner of the photo above – whose card of passes received on his return to boyhood club Villa illustrated how often he was left as a free man. .

Grealish has been good when deployed more centrally in recent weeks, notably misplacing a single pass and adding more volume to the midfield against Nottingham Forest earlier this month, but he has not scored a Premier League goal for 371 days. That he was City’s main hope for an attacking spark for much of the first half yesterday is not what a team of City’s attacking quality should be.

Grealish didn’t have a particularly bad match. He finished off a raked Stones pass after five minutes before cutting inside and shooting wide, and did well to pick out a cross for Gvardiol just before half-time. But apart from a few moments where he sought to change pace, his approach of receiving a pass then interior shot quickly became predictable – as was the case on the other flank with Bernardo – in an offensive system that leans towards chaos control in the final third.

The passing network below illustrates how Guardiola’s two wingers were isolated, missing overlapping runs from a full-back and their No.10s being marked out of play.

This is where the frustration and irony come in.

Without the protective presence of a long-term injured absentee RodriCity let go of runners, press poorly and lose duel after duel in midfield, but still persist with a dangerously high line to create the 3-2-5 structure they adopt with the ball. And when the result is slow, cumbersome and predictable, the risk of establishing yourself in this form becomes even less worth taking.

City sorely lack a reliable, destructive attacking presence when playing this way – something only became clearer when the other team bulldozed through them with, as happened on Saturday, a former City player.

They couldn’t handle Morgane Rogerswho was at the city academy but was sold to Middlesbrough of the Championship in the summer of 2023 for a fee of just over £1million at 20 with no senior appearance, then joined Villa six months later in a £15million deal, for a large part of the second semester. Although Rogers benefited from more space on the counter-attack, he brought Villa an explosiveness and dynamic that many City forwards – Bernardo, Gundogan, Grealish – cannot consistently provide.

Late consolation goal from Foden, after a wild run from the substitute Savinhowas a glimpse of what could happen when City picked up the pace and allowed their momentum to do the work. City never want a transition game, but when mistakes are made as often as they are, there are more instances where caution could be thrown out the window.

Facing Everton – a team more than happy to fold, and now armed with new information from Villa Park on how to stop this City team – next time at home on Boxing Day (Thursday), they can’t afford to be so passive in attack again.

(Top photo: Paul Ellis/AFP via Getty Images)