Manchester City moved to within two points of Arsenal at the top of the Premier League, until they play on Wednesday night, with a thrilling 5-4 win over Fulham.
Supporters of their title rivals may have turned off the game when Phil Foden made it 3-0 before half-time, expecting a simple victory for Pep Guardiola's side, but the Cityzens made hard work of their three points in the end.
Some questionable game management and defensive work from City almost led to them drawing the match, and there are several players who may not be too pleased with their own contributions to the result.
Ranking Man City's worst performers against Fulham
Whilst the likes of Erling Haaland, Tiijani Rijnders, and Phil Foden shone at Craven Cottage, some of Guardiola's players failed to deliver quality displays on Tuesday night.
man-city-donnarumma-bernardo
Gianluigi Donnarumma was one of those players. The Italy number one conceded four goals from five shots on target against him, letting in 1.95 more goals than expected, per Sofascore.
Full-back Matheus Nunes also failed to put in a convincing performance. The Portuguese defender was dribbled past twice, per Sofascore, and found defending the likes of Alex Iwobi, Samuel Chukwueze, and Kevin a bit too difficult at times.
|Ranking Man City's worst performers vs Fulham|
|Rank|Player|
|---|
|1|Bernardo Silva|
|2|Matheus Nunes|
|3|Gianluigi Donnarumma|
|4|Nico O'Reilly|
|5|Savinho|
The same was true of Nico O'Reilly, who lost ten of his 15 duels and was dribbled past once, on the other flank, whilst at the other end of the pitch, Savinho struggled off the bench, wasting several chances to counter and put the game to bed late on.
It was Bernardo Silva, though, who was arguably the worst performer on the night for the Cityzens, which is why Guardiola should ruthlessly drop him from the side.
Why Pep Guardiola should drop Bernardo Silva
The Portuguese central midfielder should be put on the bench for the clash with Sunderland at The Etihad on Saturday after an underwhelming display against Fulham.
Commentating for Sky Sports, former Premier League striker Chris Sutton described Bernardo's flicked clearance that fell for Samuel Chukwueze to score his first goal of the game as "careless".
A few minutes after that comment, Sutton added that he could not understand why the Portugal international was still on the pitch because he "doesn't have the legs" that he once did, and that Fulham had "run around" him.
bernardo-man-city-fulham
Those comments from the Premier League title winner are backed up by the fact that Bernardo failed to complete three of his four attempted tackles on the night, per Sofascore, which shows that he was a yard off the pace when attempting to challenge Fulham players.
Bernardo also struggled to get up the pitch to influence matters in the final third, with no key passes or 'big chances' created from 69 touches of the ball, albeit that was not as important on a night where City scored five goals by the 54th minute.
Vs Fulham Nunes Bernardo
Minutes 90 90
Tackles won 3/5 1/4
Duels won 9/13 7/11
Ball recoveries 3 2
Pass accuracy 83% 86%
Key passes 1 0
Stats via Sofascore
As you can see in the table above, the experienced midfielder was even worse than Nunes, who won more tackles, more duels, and made more ball recoveries, whilst also making more key passes.
Bernardo did well in moments towards the end of the match with his ability to retain possession and calm the play down, but it was partially down to his struggles out of possession and defensively that City were in a position where they had to manage the game in the final minutes.
bernardo-dias-man-city-fulham
The left-footed star is, of course, still an important player for Guardiola, having started nine league games this season, but the clash with the Black Cats is one that he should be dropped for after this disappointing showing.
Guardiola could provide Rico Lewis with a chance to play in the middle of the park or play Lewis at right-back and bring Nunes back into his natural role in midfield to see if he can improve on his own underwhelming performance.
Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola Related
[Man City now favourites to sign "incredible" £88m star, Pep's captivated by him](https://www.footballfancast.com/man-city-favourites-elliot-anderson-transfer-pep-guardiola/ "Man City now favourites to sign "incredible" £88m star, Pep's captivated by him")
City have taken the lead in the race for a Premier League star, with Pep Guardiola a big fan.
A game on the bench for Bernardo could, also, keep him fresh ahead of the big match against Real Madrid in the Champions League next week, which is another reason why this could be a good move by the Spanish head coach at the weekend.