EPL Player Of The Month – Samir Nasri

Manchester City have been fantastic in November. Three home wins and one away defeat took City back into the top four of the Premier League. Those games saw Manuel Pellegrini’s side score 16 times and concede just once, to Phil Bardsley of Sunderland. Sergio Aguero, Jesus Navas, Yaya Toure and Alvaro Negredo were fantastic, scoring many of the goals last month but it was Samir Nasri who stood out, scoring 283 points in Squawka’s Performance Score, making him the Premier League Player of the Month.

In November, the Frenchman joined his team-mates in the goal-scoring free-for-all with his two goals in the win over Swansea City. Only Aguero and Negredo (three each) scored more than Nasri last month.

He was also influential in creating for his team-mates, playing 15 key passes in four matches. Navas was closest to Nasri with 9 created chances.

Nasri spoke about his frustrations under Roberto Mancini last month but he’s put that all behind him with a string of fantastic performances. He’s been excellent in Europe, too, scoring once and creating 10 chances – again, more than anyone else.

In David Silva’s absence, Nasri has taken the creative reigns at the club and the lethal front pairing of Aguero and Negredo are benefiting because of it.

Funnily enough, Nasri created the most chances in a single match in the defeat to Sunderland. He completed seven key passes but City couldn’t score.

This screenshot was taken from the Squawka Football App – Download it here

Another impressive figure from November was Nasri’s 75% of duels won. He completed a fantastic 11 takes ons from just 13 attempts and won three of his four tackles.

Nasri also completed a fantastic 92% of his passes. It wasn’t one of the best at City as the likes of Silva and Toure are sublime on the ball but his success rate is still extremely high. Perhaps something underrated is the amount of passes he sent forward. The majority of the passes Nasri attempted went forwards which showed just how attacking City were in November, especially Nasri. For some wingers, a lot of their passes can go backwards as there isn’t always a pass on forwards so it makes it even more impressive that Nasri sent 60.7% of his forwards.

Nasri passing stats

Possibly the best statistic from Nasri’s month is his fantastic shooting. From the five shots he hit, four were on target with the fifth just narrowly wide.

Samir Nasri was fantastic for City in November and one of the main reasons as to why they returned to the top four. The former Premier League champions’ away form has been poor but even in that defeat to Sunderland, Nasri played extremely well. If he keeps up his excellent form, it’s hard to see where Pellegrini can use David Silva.