Team Focus: Can Man City Keep Momentum Up Without Agüero?

So, this is what it all comes down to for Manchester City in the Champions League, except they’ll have to do without the man that has brought them up to the highest peaks. It was finally confirmed on Monday that the sensational Sergio Agüero will miss a month of football, and is thereby one of a number of City stars to miss their effective qualification play-off at Roma tonight.

As such, the side’s chances of getting through are undeniably diminished, as are the chances of City experiencing another QPR moment - or, perhaps more relevantly in this case, their own Steven Gerrard-against-Olympiakos moment.

That is the type of occasion this group had been threatening to build up to, not least given City’s exceptional recent performances, and the win over Bayern Munich. Now, if the absence of players like Agüero means they don’t go through, the wonder is what effect all this could have on their season. It does seem that kind of do-or-die moment.

The form of the Argentine, as well as the energy he gradually restored to City’s overall play, had seemed to also restore all of their conviction and verve. You could see it in their 3-0 win at Southampton, as the English title race suddenly came alive again, and no longer looked a foregone conclusion. City looked like they believed. Now, there is a danger that could be so quickly stripped away… but also an enticing possibility it could be so positively maximised.

That is what this week feels like, something bigger than even a game with such decisive and defining dimensions. It is precisely because Champions League success has become such a profoundly desired objective for City that this clash with Roma is about so much more than that.

Given their recent momentum and that obsession, you would genuinely wonder how the deep the deflating effect of elimination in Rome would be. It could disrupt everything, and see them almost dwelling on their disappointments again. At the same time, qualification may propel their entire season, especially since the circumstances - from injuries to permutations - are so complicated.

Those are also the perils of knock-out competitions, and why some criticism of City’s poor record in the Champions League has been harsh. Short-term problems can have a disproportionately huge effect, and see a side unfortunately eliminated. That is partially the case with this game, as absences look like they might disrupt City just at the point when a remarkable recovery to qualify looked on.

Of course, that only poses another question: why the English champions are only turning it on now? Injuries to the likes of Agüero would not have been so important had they played better earlier on in this group. Instead, they’ve picked up form very late - basically after the 2-1 win over Swansea City at home in the Premier League.

It was as if the ground-out nature of that win did see the team click back into gear; to hit the reset button on their play; to remove all of the doubt. It is not a coincidence the Bayern comeback so quickly followed. Since then, they have started to again produce football on a par with some of the best they offered last season. It is not just about the run of successive wins. It is also about the obvious up-lift in their play. There’s an intricacy and greater integration to their attack again.

That can be seen in how their pass success in the final third has shot up from 75.7% to 81.4% since the Swansea game. As has been patently clear in their play, they are finding each other so much more sharply, and combining with greater quality. Even the increased number of offsides - 1.5 up to 2.5 - indicates a side more willing to try and get in behind defences, to pull them apart.

From all that, there is also the most striking stat of all - the radical improvement in their conversion rate, from 10.3% before Swansea to 18.7% since. The potency has returned… but the wonder is whether it can remain so high without Agüero.

He has scored so many goals of late (7 in his last 6 games to be precise) but, as with all the elite strikers in the modern game, he is about so much more than even that dead-eyed finishing.

Agüero’s Romario-like running and link-up play foster that City intricacy arguably more than any other City player except David Silva. It is his technique that often enables them to so often sever a team’s back line despite a premium on space.

The figures make that as abundantly clear as his obvious talent. When Agüero is in the team, City can be confident enough to actually construct play in the opposition third, as indicated by the far greater number of passes there, shooting up from 161 to 199.3. That is where all of those glorious one-twos arrive, and a further consequence of that is that City don’t need to go one-dimensional so often, with the percentage of the passes which are long balls dropping from 9.2% to 7.9%.

It would be wildly wrong, however, to presume that all of this means sacrificing incision with indulgence. Agüero brings an aggression and directness, as well as an elevation in quality of play. When the Argentine is in the team, City win much more possession in the final third - 4.0 per game rather than 2.0 - and they take way more shots, firing up to 17.6 from 12.

You don’t even need to say how much they need this against Roma. At the least, Edin Dzeko is set to return, and he does have a history of big goals. It’s a big moment. This is what it comes down to.