MANCHESTER City supporters have long grown tired of the accusation that Phil Foden’s development is stalling due to a lack of first-team opportunities. The kid needs game time. He should be loaned out. Pep Guardiola doesn’t trust youth. These tropes are endlessly recycled across the media, more often than not by rent-a-quotes whose understanding of the situation is entirely derived from listening to other rent-a-quotes saying the same thing.
To make matters worse, for a good while now it has felt like another stick to beat the club with and this much-aired criticism masquerading as concern is especially irritating when it’s accompanied by a strong suspicion that the youngster’s progress would be viewed very differently elsewhere.
Foden is a home-grown, life-long Blue blessed with a rare and exciting talent whose career is being shaped by a progressive genius. Surely when a breath is taken to allow some sense to prevail only positives reveal themselves for both club and country?
At the risk of crafting a tinfoil hat how would this scenario be perceived at Old Trafford or Anfield where a brilliant teen with the world at his feet and the club’s DNA in his blood is carefully being nurtured by a manager with the player’s best interests at heart? It would be wholly celebrated and applauded as a ‘good thing’ all round.
| Manchester City are braced to make at least five new signings, with academy graduates Phil Foden, Eric Garcia, Taylor Harwood-Bellis and Tommy Doyle also likely to get more game time.
[@MullockSMirror] pic.twitter.com/1fDXNRYnJD
— City Chief (@City_Chief) February 1, 2020
Running parallel to this however, Manchester City supporters are growing increasingly exasperated at the almost incontestable fact that Foden’s development is stalling due to a lack of first-team opportunities. The kid needs game time and the charge that Pep doesn’t trust youth is becoming ever more convincing. With every passing match-day that has the Stockport Iniesta residing on the bench annoyance among the Etihad faithful intensifies.
Yes the double-standard here is clear. It is hypocrisy should it be assessed harshly. In a more magnanimous light it can be excused as a typical fan trait of thinking nothing of criticising your own club but woe betide any outsider interfering in family matters. But more than this it comes down to timing.
The narrative that Foden’s immense potential was under threat at City began in earnest last season but then it was far too early, not to mention erroneous to state so. The midfielder was 18 and competing to break into a side entrenched in a ferocious and sustained title fight with Liverpool so naturally Guardiola turned to his senior superstars to get them through and in a campaign where every match and every point mattered, Foden found himself behind Bernardo Silva whose performances led to a Ballon d’Or nomination and the effervescent maestro David Silva whose eight league assists proved pivotal. Then there was Kevin De Bruyne – arguably the world’s best of his type – returning from injury on two occasions.
Yet despite all this Foden still made 10 starts across all competitions and 15 appearances from the bench for a team challenging on four fronts at the very highest level and all at a callow age when it’s the norm to be loaned down the pyramid to gain experience. He established himself as an integral figure in a squad that history will marvel at. Against Spurs late in the season with the title very much on the line Foden was the difference-maker, scoring the only goal of the game.
So while outsiders wrung their hands and knotted their brows Blues scoffed, safe in the knowledge that this season would see the brief auditions convert to starring roles as the gradual succession of David Silva took place. Sure, it would be a hand-over done in increments because the legendary schemer still had so much to give in his valedictory year. It would be enough though to quieten the rent-a-quotes once and for all.
Only that hasn’t happened. In fact the concern has only worsened and widened, now shared by many Blues even if the negative press still vexes.
Pep Guardiola intends to use Phil Foden as David Silva’s replacement next season with a source close to the Manchester City manager claiming he can become the club’s 'home-grown legend for the next 10 to 12 years'.
[@JBurtTelegraph] pic.twitter.com/ncy99bNFIT
— Man City Xtra (@City_Xtra) February 3, 2020
From August’s Community Shield to date Phil Foden has played 900 minutes in all competitions this term and purely in terms of game time he is going backwards. At Arsenal, Gabriel Martinelli has played significantly more. At Chelsea, Callum Hudson-Odoi has played significantly more. At Manchester United, Mason Greenwood and Brandon Williams have played significantly more. All are younger than a prodigy defined to this point by his age.
More worrying still City’s circumstances at present not only facilitate the promotion of Foden but demand it. The form of Bernardo Silva has been patchy at best while David Silva’s influence is visibly waning. A midfield staffed by Rodri and Ilkay Gundogan lacks animation resulting in the Blues being too reliant on De Bruyne to provide creativity and what they are desperately crying out for is youthful endeavour and ambition and energy: exactly the attributes the teen possesses in spades.
An inconsistent few months meanwhile has put City firmly out of the title reckoning while conversely the idea that they might miss out on a top four berth is implausible. It is therefore no longer imperative for Guardiola to lean on his senior stars to get over the line. There is no line.
Of most pertinence though, trumping all of the above, is that England’s brightest talent of his generation is ready. He has served his apprenticeship and learned from the best. He is now kicking his heels, wasted on the bench, fully equipped to become the best and in a period where City must now prepare for the second and final act of Guardiola’s reign the question that needs shouting from the rooftops is that if the Catalan won’t play him now, then when?
“Next year David Silva is not going to be there and he will get more chances,” Guardiola said last week, once again buying himself time. But bluntly we have heard it all before and he is fast running out of reasons and all the while the fretting of the critics and the fretting from Blues become ever more in synch.
