Niall McCaughan, Jim Salveson and Alex Boardman discussed the latest goings-on in the Premier League during a recent edition of the Football Social Daily podcast and one of the topics of discussion was Manchester City attacker Gabriel Jesus and whether or not he is the right man to succeed Sergio Aguero at the Etihad Stadium as City’s main striker.
Since joining City from Atletico Madrid in July 2011 for £36m, Aguero has been prolific for the club, scoring a total of 180 goals in England’s top flight thus far, making him the fourth-highest goalscorer in Premier League history, trailing only Alan Shearer, Wayne Rooney and Andy Cole.
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Aguero, who is currently out of action due to a knee injury, has accumulated just 1,456 minutes of Premier League game time for City this term. Even if the Argentina international were to play every minute in each of City’s remaining four Premier League games, the 2019/20 campaign would see him accumulate the second-lowest amount of game time of any his league seasons at Manchester City, while he has currently played fewer minutes this term than he has played in any other Premier League campaign.
As a result, it may be fair to say that City might need to be thinking about life after 32-year-old Aguero, whose contract is set to expire next summer.
Salveson shared his thoughts on City attacker Jesus during the latest edition of the Football Social Daily podcast and discussed whether or not the Brazilian is ‘the man to replace Aguero’ at the Etihad.
After sarcastically referring to Jesus as a ‘terrible player’, Salveson said: “How can a player that’s scored 19 goals, not just in the Premier League, obviously, he’s scored them in the Champions League, League Cup and whatnot as well – he’s still had a pretty decent return.
“When you consider he’s not been playing every single game either, and a lot of his appearances have been as subs, it’s difficult to really criticise him.
“Is he the man to replace Aguero? I don’t think he is, but at the same time, I don’t think he’s quite the same type of player as Aguero.
“He kind of reminds me of Javier Hernandez a little bit in terms of, he’s kind of that poacher, he’s the archetypal, Arsene Wenger, ‘fox in the box’, so I don’t think he is a straight replacement for Aguero.”
Is Gabriel Jesus the man to replace Sergio Aguero?YES
NO
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TIF Thoughts…
Despite playing more Premier League minutes than Aguero this season, Jesus has scored five fewer goals than the 32-year-old in England’s top flight.
Furthermore, according to Understat, Jesus’ expected goals (xG) for the 2019/20 Premier League season is 17.3, of which he is underperforming by 6.3, which is arguably a considerable number of goals. Meanwhile, Aguero is slightly overperforming his xG by 0.44 goals.
This may indicate that Jesus has not made the most of the goalscoring opportunities that have presented themselves to him this season and this might not convince City that he is an adequate replacement for such a prolific goalscorer like Aguero. Despite the fact that the £50.4m-rated Brazilian forward currently plays for City, the club may still decide to look elsewhere to find a permanent heir for Aguero when the 32-year-old does eventually leave the club.