‘Special’ Phil Foden is making the sublime seem easy

The greatest players have a knack for making the incredulous utterly mundane, an almost innate sense of rhythm that reduces the most complicated of manoeuvres to an effortless slow dance. Midway through the second half of Manchester City’s victory on Wednesday, Phil Foden was left isolated on the left wing as two Brighton defenders swarmed towards him. The pair of sublime pirouettes that followed might have seemed flash if only they weren’t quite so instinctive, with Foden skipping away like an escape artist. The 20-year-old’s flair is not necessarily unique but it is uncannily innate, honed by a maturity that belies his age.

Perhaps, the only time Foden doesn’t appear entirely at ease is when he shoots. His vague sense of delight, formed simply by the joy of playing, is replaced by a rapid puffing of the cheeks, an intense concentration. If there is something balletic about the ball at Foden’s feet, his finishing is all about urgency. His winning goal against Brighton, darting onto Kevin De Bruyne’s through ball at the end of an otherwise dull first half, was struck so early with his weaker right foot it seemed to stun Robert Sanchez. The result, though, was still just as precise, with the ball almost trickling into the corner of the goalkeeper’s near post.

"I have never enjoyed my football as much as I am now,” Foden said afterwards. “When you are scoring goals your confidence is so high,” Suitably, he is now City’s top goalscorer, with eight in all competitions this season, and a diminutive player is growing into a towering stature.

READ MORE: Why Guardiola loves Brighton, the strangest team this season

Foden has already made 96 senior appearances for City and yet somehow it still feels impossible to judge the height of his ceiling - other than the fact it will be measured in stories rather than feet. He has played in almost every offensive position under Pep Guardiola and, against Brighton, showed how he’s adding strings to his bow rather than being spread too thin - present in every attack, drifting inside to draw space, slipping in behind the defence at little expense of ingenuity. There are strong suspicions that his prime will be played out in the No 10 role, but versatile demands are helping to sharpen Foden’s wits.

What is already abundantly clear is that football’s hyperbolic signifiers of potential- wonderkid, golden boy etc. - are already outdated. Foden is, on current form, an almost undroppable component in one of Europe’s best sides, keeping the likes of Raheem Sterling and Ferran Torres on the bench. In terms of technical ability, he is within touching distance of any current England international, even at this early stage of his career, and should be a certainty for Gareth Southgate’s squad at Euro 2020.

And yet, all glowing compliments aside, it can be hard to refine Foden’s strengths down to any one specific attribute. Joel Latibeaudiere, the captain of England’s U17 World Cup-winning side, once spoke about what made certain players in the squad so prodigious. “Phil is just Phil,” he said after arriving at Foden. “He’s just special.”

Those were the exact same words used by Pep Guardiola after giving Foden his first appearance in pre-season in the summer of 2017. “I would like to have the right words to describe what I saw,” he said almost giddily. “He’s a gift for us. He’s special.”

It has, of course, not always been a smooth passage to this point. Like in any burgeoning career, there have been frustrations at a lack of game time, rare moments of indiscipline, and a process of adjustment to Guardiola’s exhaustive ideals.

There has always been a clarity, though, too. An assurance that, with Guardiola’s coaching, Foden can be moulded into one of the world’s best midfielders, pushed and punished to harness every facet of the game to an exceptional degree. He is Guardiola’s perfect project, with an affinity and willingness to learn. If it can’t be said quite how good Foden can yet be, then perhaps it serves best to look at how far he has already come in such a short space of time.

“He deserves to play. His standards are higher,” Guardiola said on Wednesday. “He is 20 years old; just look at the stats. The amount of games, the goals and the assists since he joined us compared to the bigger stars in English football at his age.”

Foden’s finish against Brighton was just another example of that rapid improvement, a perfect shot hit like little more than a pass. The sublime made to look like extraordinarily easy.