Paul Merson has claimed that Mateo Kovacic has caused a problem for Pep Guardiola at Manchester City.
The midfielder made his first competitive appearance for the Manchester club last weekend in their 1-1 draw against Arsenal in the Community Shield after arriving from Chelsea back in June in a deal worth £30m.
Even though he played just 66 minutes of the game at Wembley Stadium, one pundit has found a potential issue that the Croatian has caused in City’s team.
Merson says Kovacic has created a problem for Guardiola
In a recent column for Sportskeeda written prior to City’s opening Premier League match against Burnley, Merson said this about Kovacic and his connection with Jack Grealish in the Community Shield.
He said: “With Kovavic dribbling from the left of midfield, Grealish barely gets a touch of the ball. It’s an interesting problem for Pep Guardiola to solve.”
During his time on the pitch last weekend, the 29-year-old had 66 touches of the ball in total, accurately completing 54 of the 61 passes he attempted, making one key pass as well.
In terms of his dribbles that Merson mentioned, Kovacic only made one and successfully completed it. However, in terms of Grealish’s presence in the game, he only had 27 touches of the ball in 58 minutes, leaving only Erling Haaland (13) with fewer touches out of City players that started the game.
Whether Guardiola sees this as a problem or not, it’s potentially something that the City boss can work on with the two players given how it’s still early days in the season and early in Kovacic’s career as a City player.
