There is a story from the past few weeks that neatly sums up Matheus Nunes’ first season at Manchester City.
The Portugal midfielder signed from Wolves for €62million (£53m; $66m at today’s rates) last summer and is going through what is commonly understood as ‘first-season syndrome’ under Pep Guardiola at the Etihad Stadium.
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Nunes has made seven Premier League starts, five of those against teams in the current bottom six, plus five in the Champions League and one in the FA Cup and Club World Cup. He has shown flashes of the ball-carrying ability that City want to add to their squad but has not made a strong case to be a regular starter.
In April, as Pep Guardiola weighed up his team selection for a home match against Champions League hopefuls Aston Villa, with half a mind on managing minutes of players who would feature in away games at Crystal Palace and Real Madrid, he gave serious consideration to starting Nunes.
The Premier League run-in
Guardiola believes Nunes is a useful player and wants to involve him more. Nunes is said to be a good guy who trains well and, crucially for the manager, he has not complained about his relatively few minutes — 17 players have played more in the league for City this season.
However, Guardiola ultimately decided the Villa game was too important and instead turned to Bernardo Silva — who was tired and needed a rest (which still seems to be the case) — but was seen as the more reliable option.
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There is no surprise there; Bernardo has been at City for seven years and knows the gameplan inside out, but the club’s decision-makers also recognise that Nunes has not yet shown his best level. Part of the reason he has been overlooked for games against the better teams is he is more likely to give the ball away than his midfield colleagues, with a fluctuating level of performance even within games: sometimes eye-catching, sometimes careless.
He has shown a dazzling ability to evade pressure far from the opponents’ goal, suddenly change gear and cover 50-60 yards, which would be invaluable in Guardiola’s team given few other players can. Not as cleanly as Nunes, anyway.
He also has a desire to make runs in behind opposition defences, which City’s other midfielders do not do, and that helps the team stretch opponents and create space for others. Alongside Erling Haaland, it is particularly disruptive.
But there are rough edges to smooth; for example, as seen above, his execution around the box needs to improve (he is not considered a natural goalscorer) and he can be easier to dispossess than his team-mates deeper on the pitch. While he is not seen as another Kalvin Phillips — the unfortunate marker for a disappointing City signing given he basically never started a match of note — Nunes is not in contention for many matches unless the opposition are more forgiving and/or the game is expected to be open.
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Otherwise, he generally has to be content with 15-20 minutes at the end, if Guardiola considers City’s lead to be insurmountable.
City turned to Nunes late in the summer transfer window after abandoning their pursuit of West Ham’s Lucas Paqueta when news of a Football Association investigation into alleged betting rule breaches came to light.
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City plan to reignite their interest in Paqueta if no charges are brought against the Brazilian and they would expect him to show a higher level and contribute to more matches, compared to Nunes.
Either Bernardo or Kevin De Bruyne, possibly both, could leave this summer and City are making transfer plans with that in mind. A move for Paqueta and even a second midfielder (City are interested in Newcastle’s Bruno Guimaraes as well and they have made enquiries about Bayern Munich’s Jamal Musiala) would not necessarily spell trouble for Nunes, but he would not automatically move up the pecking order either.
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He will have to push on next season to fulfil his potential and help City move towards their plans to add a new dimension to their midfield.
As part of evolving the squad after winning the treble last year, each of the four players City brought in during the summer is comfortable carrying the ball. Guardiola confirmed this was no coincidence and it would help his team when they come up against opponents that either defend deep or mark them man-to-man because a midfielder with Nunes’ skill set can use his ability to glide past a player or two and disrupt the other team’s organisation.
“When you dribble past a player, the opponent has to decide whether to leave their man to face you, or stay where they are and leave space for you,” Guardiola explained in the autumn.
Josko Gvardiol is the new signing with the most minutes to his name and is comfortable carrying the ball from defence, although Guardiola told him during the season he should try to force things less and to keep things simple.
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Jeremy Doku had a flying start to his time at City, then a quiet middle period and has recently rediscovered some good form, while Mateo Kovacic has proven to be a steady pair of hands but has not been able to dislodge Rodri, Bernardo, De Bruyne or Phil Foden.
With Nunes needing time to show his best form, City have generally used the same players they did last season, minus Ilkay Gundogan.
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“We have to wait, we are going to help them, we talked a lot with them,” Guardiola said of his new signings early in the season. “First season when he arrived, Bernardo didn’t play much and now is irreplaceable for us, so it is a question of time for Jeremy… Matheus knows the Premier League better but it is a question of time to adapt and they will adapt. And we have time to wait.”
Interestingly, Guardiola has since spoken about how he felt Doku was “shy” during his debut and he was speaking about the Belgian’s need for time in the days immediately after that game, so would have been talking with more caution at that point compared to how he talks now.
There was the same cautious tone with Nunes, but there is a recognition of what he can bring to the team and how he has fitted into a calm and harmonious dressing room.
“Everyone is delighted to have him in the locker room; he has a specific quality that we didn’t have, his transition play is one of the best I have ever seen,” Guardiola said in January.
“The way we play and the dynamic, sometimes we need a little bit longer, but for specific things, he is fantastic.”
That may sound worryingly similar to how Guardiola spoke about Phillips: he often focused on how good a guy he is and said that the England midfielder’s approach lent itself to specific circumstances, albeit circumstances that rarely applied to City matches.
That is not the case for Nunes, who fits the mould well in theory, and he has shown hints of that during his first season — but there will have to be more to come.
(Top photo: Francois Nel/Getty Images)
