Something just isn’t quite right with Leroy Sane at the minute. Having been unexpectedly excluded from Germany’s World Cup squad, the prodigious winger should have started the season firing on all cylinders, increasing the level of form that earned him the PFA Young Player of the Year award last term and really cementing his status as a relentlessly potent, undroppable part of Pep Guardiola’s goal-getting side.
But if anything, the Manchester City manager’s comments in pre-season and subsequent omissions of Sane from his first two Premier League starting lineups only justify Joachim Lowe’s decision not to take the 22-year-old to Russia.
Clearly, both managers feel his attitude isn’t what it should be, and for a player of such undoubted talent that’s a real worry. It’s often the most gifted footballers who end up falling by the wayside when their mindset doesn’t quite match their natural ability.
“It depends on him. He needs more minutes, he needs to come back to his principles in terms of being aggressive without the ball. He has to come back. Of course he has all the talent to do that so we are happy for him to score but he is still far away from his best condition.”
Pep Guardiola on Leroy Sane, July 2018
Tactically too, Sane’s starting to struggle for relevance in this City team, which has probably been a bigger factor than Guardiola’s concerns over his conditioning and aggression from late July.
It may seem a strange notion considering Sane played a hand in almost as many Premier League goals as Raheem Sterling last season, but the reintroduction of Benjamin Mendy has added a new dynamic to this City team – perhaps the only dynamic they didn’t have last season amid his lengthy bout on the sidelines.
Two appearances this term have brought three assists – five if we include the cross that Ben Hamer spilled into Sergio Aguero’s path and the dispossession that bounced its way back to Gabriel Jesus on the edge of the box – and that highlights how the Frenchman operates from left-back, relentlessly powering forward to provide width in attack.
Because he’s so effective at not only bombing down the touchline but also putting deliveries into the box, the need for what Sane offers this City team suddenly diminishes. After all, if Mendy plays the No.3 role as essentially a left winger, why have an actual left winger on the pitch at all? They only end up getting in each other’s way, trying to occupy the same space.
That’s why Guardiola selected Sterling and Jesus instead against Arsenal and Huddersfield respectively; both players can play anywhere across the front line or just behind the centre-forward, and in practice their inclusions essentially created a strike partner for Aguero. Athough Sane – who Transfermarkt value at £81million – got the ball into the net by way of an own goal after being brought on against Huddersfield, his introduction actually debased the tactic that had otherwise served City so well on Sunday.
Suddenly, Mendy found himself much deeper to help make room for Sane, mostly passing the ball simply and squarely, as the relentless supply from the left dried up.
Of course, that doesn’t mean Sane’s City career has been ended by Mendy at any stretch of the imagination, or for that matter that he won’t eventually replicate the level of output he produced in the Premier League last season. After all, players of his calibre are always adaptable and although it makes far more sense tactically to use a striker in an inside forward role, or even a right-footed playmaker with Mendy providing the width and penetration on the overlap, Sane’s game is strong enough to find a way of being effective as a more central influence.
But it’s also a question of how willing to adapt Sane actually is, and the current signs aren’t all that encouraging. Even if public opinion widely disagreed with his omission from the Germany squad, there’s clearly a lingering doubt about Sane or else two of the modern managerial greats, one at club and the other at international level, would have full faith in including him in their plans.
For a young player whose pathway to the top has been essentially carved out for him, Mendy’s emergence represents perhaps the biggest test he’s faced yet in his short but hugely promising career. More than Sane’s ability, which has never been in doubt, it’s a question of hunger and mentality.
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