Manchester City return to Champions League action bolstered by a brilliant 1-0 weekend win over Chelsea.
Gabriel Jesus started on the right-wing, but ultimately filled the boots of former teammate Sergio Aguero well by showing up in a big game with a vital goal.
Next up are Paris Saint-Germain on Tuesday and a certain Lionel Messi, who appeared to be on the verge of joining City in 2020.
City Is Ours team members Dom Farrell and Alex Brotherton discussed whether Pep Guardiola's team would be better off with Messi in their dressing room at the Parc des Princes, or if the failure to land the six-time Ballon d'Or winner actually worked in City's favour.
DF: “The big arrival for PSG is Lionel Messi. For all his great qualities, he doesn’t do that work off the ball that he used to do when he was younger at Barcelona. He sees the game, picks his moments - he does it exceptionally well.
“You just look at his return in a poor Barcelona team last year, it’s still all there. But, this Messi now - we know how close City got to signing him in 2020 - is he a guy that you regret him not being at City? Is he the one that got away? Or at this stage is it a case of, d'you know what, it wasn’t meant to be and it was best both parties went in their separate directions?”
AB: “It’s a tough one isn’t it. I think any City fan would be lying if they said they didn’t want Messi to come to City because there's obviously the link with Guardiola. He is a Guardiola player, or at least he was back in 2010, 11 and 12.
“But, then you look at the Chelsea game on Saturday. If Lionel Messi is in that starting eleven for City we don’t play that way. Okay, City don't play that every single week because frankly, they don’t need to.
“In those kinds of games, Messi isn’t going to be in that system where the front three or four as it was lots of times press with Grealish, Jesus and then with De Bruyne and Foden coming through the middle.
“Messi isn’t going to be a part of that intense press that City were subjecting Chelsea to. I think it would have been wonderful to see him play at City and I think maybe in 2020 at that point I would have said 'yes'. Maybe in the big games, where City decide to go with that intense pressing approach, he doesn’t start.
That's obviously not going to sit well with him, he’s the best player in the world. In hindsight, he isn’t the greatest fit for what Guardiola wants to do at City. We’ve seen that that isn’t the be-all and end-all.
“The general consensus with Cristiano Ronaldo was that he isn’t a good fit for City and Guardiola himself thought the same, but he was still going to bring him in because he was desperate to have an out and out striker.
“City have a more balanced team and a more flexible team that doesn’t have to go through one player like Messi. If Messi’s in your team you’d have to give him the ball quite a lot.
"Maybe Tuesday’s game against PSG will give us an insight into if City have come out well from not signing him or not. I guess we’ll have to see.”
Do you think Manchester City should have signed Lionel Messi? Follow our City Is Ours team members Dom , Alex and Renuka on Twitter to get involved in the discussion and give us your thoughts in the comments section below.
