Sergio Aguero’s contribution against Everton this past weekend exemplified pretty precisely his contribution for the whole of this season.
With Manchester City trailing 1-0 in a game that should have the largest single say left in who’ll walk off with the Premier League title, Aguero turned his marker and smashed the ball past Tim Howard before the idea of saving it had even arrived into his head, equalizing and dragging City back towards victory. Then, ten minutes later, he went off injured.
Football has a cliché for pretty much everything and Aguero’s “stop-start” season is no different in that respect. But unlike other players afflicted with the pains of the “stop-start” season—Aaron Ramsey, say—Aguero’s goal-scoring has still, probably, somehow, managed to be one of the decisive aspects of City creeping past Liverpool and Chelsea. Cumulatively, he’s spent months out injured, but whenever he’s turned up, it’s been with serious goals attached.
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It’s as though he’s honed goal-scoring to its absolute finest point. At first it was an art, then it was a craft, then it was the inevitable, statistical conclusion of creating a certain number of chances in a certain number of games. And then Aguero got it down to playing 20 minutes, doing the business, then getting out for an ice bath and a sense of quiet satisfaction. His goal-scoring’s so efficient that after Everton he now appears to consider second halves an unhealthy excess, played out only by lesser players—like everyone else on the pitch.
Okay, that’s a mild exaggeration. But the point is valid. Aguero’s overtaken Thierry Henry as the most regular scorer in Premier League history—one goal every 115 minutes against Henry’s lazy-by-comparison one every 122—via a season in which he’s averaged a goal every 80 minutes. That’s kind of ridiculous. I mean, there’s the idea that it only takes a second to score a goal, perpetuated by those in the Chelsea-Norwich crowd attempting to keep themselves warm through the long, inglorious winter that was that 0-0 draw. But someone should tell Aguero that it’s not really a realistic target goal-scoring rate, even if he is actually getting close.
He might even be the most decisive player in the league this season—if City does win the title—despite starting 19 games and only finishing four of those. At ground level it’s an absurd claim, given the existence of the aforementioned statistic and the fact that he’s playing alongside Yaya Toure and competing against Luis Suarez, but look at City’s season and it starts seeming a lot more sensible.
First, City’s only failed to win twice when Aguero’s scored one of his 17 goals, so when he’s playing well, the Blues win. Second, City’s biggest, confidence-melting defeat of the season came against Chelsea in February, a week after hammering Tottenham 5-1 away from home, with Aguero’s absence the key difference between the two games. Third, his league comeback has coincided with City’s comeback into title contention. And fourth, his return to goal-scoring at West Brom and Everton looks to have helped stabilize his team just in time to nab a league winners’ medal.
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In individual moments in individual games—against Everton, West Ham, West Brom, Manchester United, Sunderland, Norwich and Cardiff—his goals have been important, but in the context of City’s season they’ve been definitive. If you want to remember further back, City didn’t win away from home this season until he scored twice to put away West Ham. Back then, it was his run of goals that put City in a position where it looked like they might walk away with the league title; now he’s come back and held its hand for the final bit because it apparently didn’t like that walk.
In doing all this, he’s created one of the greatest partial seasons ever, managing to be perpetually injured and also possibly decisive in a title race simultaneously. It’s completely odd. He’s missed the majority of City’s minutes this season, yet because he’s also achieved the best goal-scoring rate the league has ever seen, he’s also made a huge impact on its title challenge and now probable win.
Basically, Aguero’s cut the nonsense. He’s knocked off the noise. He’s reduced the game to turning up occasionally, knocking in a goal, then nipping off until the moment he’s required again. It’s so simple when you’re that good at scoring goals; Aguero could well have decided the title having started and finished only four games.
To be honest, Luis Suarez will probably feel pretty down about all the effort he’s put in if he finds this out.
Ethan Dean-Richards is a Winnipeg-based writer. Follow him on Twitter