Bernardo Silva is a 22 year old 1.73m (5 foot 8 inch) Portugese right sided midfielder who has signed for Manchester City from Monaco for a reported fee of £43m. In this fantasy premier league new players article, we look at the player, assessing his stats and his fantasy prospects for Manchester City with particular emphasis on fantasy premier league. Obviously the player at this stage doesn’t have a value in FPL
FANTASY PREMIER LEAGUE NEW PLAYERS – MAN CITY MIDFIELDER BERNARDO SILVA
Statistics
Here’s the stats for his last 3 years for Monaco in the French League and the European Cup competitions.
League stats
European Stats
Comparison with his Man City team mates
For this I’ve just used League stats and I’ve used the Transfermarkt website stats to compare accurately. These stats have a stricter interpretation of assists meaning they are lower than the FPL site
Squawka comparison
His international record is 11 games for Portugal with 1 goal scored. He didn’t appear in Euro 2016 due to injury
HIS PROSPECTS
Style of play
He seems to be a perfect fit for a Guardiola team. Good dribbler, incisive passer, good on the counter and flexible positionally.
For Monaco he played most of his games wide right in a 4-4-2 with Silva excelling in cutting in on his right to shoot with his left. He can play in either of the flank positions in 4-3-3 or any of the attacking midfield positions in 4-2-3-1.
He’s most commonly been compared to his namesake David Silva. However, David Silva has often played deeper this season as his stats show.
Stats
Considering the price tag and the amount of goals Monaco scored I was expecting them to be better than they were. In pure stats he’s well behind De Bruyne and Sterling although ahead of Sane.
His returns are well behind FPL midfield giants of Eriksen, and Coutinho although this year he’s not far behind Ozil’s disappointing season.
Even the likes of Pedro he’s well behind.
In terms of his Man City team mates, Sane looks his closest comparison in underlying stats. However, B Silva’s shots in the box and chances created are especially disappointing.
Gametime
General thoughts
With Pep the only thing you can be certain about is uncertainty and with the Chairman stating they will be fighting for the quadruple expect mass rotation all over the place. Even someone so crucial to the play in De Bruyne and Silva were given time off this season. The annoying thing about Pep though is it’s not total time off. They are always likely to play a few minutes just to ensure a 1 pointer for your team. That is now part and parcel of picking a Man City player.
Personally I thought it was a strange first transfer considering he’s got Sterling and De Bruyne who can play there. I guess he is looking to get rid of Nolito and with Navas gone then the position in theory has seen some vacancies.
Apparently according to a Manchester Evening News article pep has said he wants him to play on the right or in the middle. Unfortunately that isn’t that helpful with the potential formations Pep could play.
4-3-3
What I find particularly strange though is that Jesus played on the right of a front 3 in the last fixture and Aguero lead the line centrally. That worked well to the extent of 6 goals even if it was against a surrendered Watford side. This transfer seems to limit the amount of times this will happen. However if you think that Sane will be first choice on the left and Jesus first choice striker then that leaves either Aguero or B Silva consigned to the bench in that formation. Maybe he will keep Jesus on the right with Aguero central and B Silva becomes a £43m luxury. Given all the positive Aguero words from the Chairman this seems a strange first transfer.
4-2-3-1 and 4-1-4-1
Even in 4-2-3-1 if De Bruyne is going to figure centrally where he has been effective and Jesus to lead the line that questions Aguero’s role. Aguero could play behind Jesus with De Bruyne on the right and B Silva again becomes a luxury bench/rotation option.
I can’t see 4-1-4-1 happening without a major Aguero fall out as I think Jesus will lead the line in that formation.
Reinvented as David Silva mark 2
Buying someone for that price and then reinventing him seems a bit far fetched but it has been mooted as a possibility. Indeed his flexibility is one of his strengths.
It’s possible he could be lined up as cover/successor to David Silva playing deeper in either the midfield 3 of 4-3-3 or centrally in 4-1-4-1. That possibly limits his appeal as we’ve seen with David Silva who seems to have become the assister to the assister.
The upshot is that it’s hard to see at this stage Bernardo Silva nailed on to start first choice in any formation. Bernardo Silva will be rotated as will everyone to different extents.
Only in pre-season and initial games will we be able to start to evaluate this risk.
How does he rate as a prospect in the City team?
The season ended with FPL managers looking to focus their City coverage with Jesus firstly, then Sane and De Bruyne. If you look at our last 10 top FPL managers article all 10 owned Jesus with 6 owning Sane and only 1 owning De Bruyne.
I can see Jesus and Sane, with their first season behind them, improving. Aguero may get a price drop and De Bruyne offers consistency with those who like set piece based players. It’s hard to see the reason to jump onto a new boy who probably won’t be far behind some of them, if at all, on price
SUMMARY
Played mostly as a right midfielder
OK stats for a midfielder but nothing outstanding for the price paid and with the goals Monaco scored
Difficult to predict where he will start and in what formation. So whats new with Pep.
Does have significant rotation risk and initial gametime risk
Hard to see as a Man City option given the alternatives.
As ever pre-season will start to give clues
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