David Silva enjoyed a very successful decade as a Manchester City player.
Back in the 2010 summer transfer window, City signed Silva from Valencia after seeing him feature in Spain’s World Cup-winning campaign in South Africa.
During his time at the Etihad Stadium, the midfielder appeared in 436 games across all competitions, scoring 77 goals and delivering 131 assists along the way.
To highlight how iconic he is and the impact he had, Phil Foden named Silva as one of his favourite players when he was young.
With the Spaniard contributing to so many trophy wins during his time at the club, it was one of his 131 assists that really established Silva as a fan favourite at the Manchester club.
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David Silva’s stunning assist in Man City’s 6-1 thrashing against Man United
In October 2011, Roberto Mancini took his City side to Old Trafford for a derby clash against Manchester United.
This ended up being one of the most memorable matches of City’s famous title-winning 2011/12 season.
With City smashing their rivals 6-1, with Silva scoring the fifth, it was actually what he did after that goal that saw him show what a gem of a player he is.
After Joleon Lescott cleared the ball out of City’s penalty box, Chris Smalling headed the ball inadvertently at Silva, who after controlling it in mid-air, volleyed the ball through United’s centre-backs with a long-range pass that Edin Dzeko got on the end of before bagging the sixth goal of the match.
As the rest of that season panned out, the Blues went on to win their first Premier League title on the final day of the campaign through Sergio Aguero’s historic injury-time winning goal against Queens Park Rangers.
What was the reaction to Silva’s volleyed assist in Man City vs Man United at the time?
Given the brilliance of this assist from Silva, it unsurprisingly garnered significant reactions.
ESPN wrote: “Goodness gracious me, a volley from SIlva puts Dzeko in the clear and he makes no mistake this time, finishing past [David] De Gea with ease. Mancini can’t keep the grin off his face.”
More recently, in November 2023, Alan Shearer said this in an episode of MOTD Top 10 (via BBC Sport) about the greatness of Silva’s assist,
He said: “It’s the way he keeps it up and sort of hits it at the top of his foot, right in his path.”
In the same episode, Micah Richards, who played in this game, said this about Silva’s overall display/
He said: “Great memories. I got man of the match that day. David Silva had one of the best games I have ever seen, and I got man of the match. I don’t understand how I got man of the match. Gary Neville gave me it – I couldn’t believe it. I was good that day though, I gave the left-back a torrid time.”
Taking all of that on board, in addition to Noel Gallagher naming Silva as the best City player he’s ever seen, there’s no doubt about how great of a player he was for the Manchester club and how he proved himself to be one of the greatest Premier League talents.
