Manchester City fans can count themselves exceptionally lucky to have had the pleasure of watching two of the best midfielders in the history of the game over the past 12 years.
David Silva and Kevin de Bruyne both redefined what it meant to be a midfielder in the Premier League, with the latter still pushing boundaries and destroying opponents every week. Silva arrived in 2010 just as Sheikh Mansour's City project was beginning to pick up pace, and with his technical genius established himself as a club legend over 10 glorious years.
De Bruyne will surely be regarded as a club legend when he departs; he is perhaps the most complete midfielder in the world, with two PFA Player of the Year awards proving that his counterparts recognise just how good he is.
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One of those is West Ham midfielder Declan Rice, a player who, while being interviewed on Tubes and Ange Golf Life, Rice that the City duo are some of the best midfielders he's ever come up against.
"There are so many [good midfielders] I can't even describe or pick out one," Rice said.
"De Bruyne was just special, the way he thinks about the game, the position he picks up for a holding midfielder is horrible he just makes you think. Same with David Silva when he was in the Premier League, he was the exact same, [you] couldn't get near, technically one and two touch he was just one step ahead of everyone.
"Hazard when he was in the Premier League with Chelsea, I was only just starting then but he was so quick, so agile. Even when I played against Thiago at Liverpool, last season, he's just so silky. He plays the game at his own pace, he was proper."
Rice looked like he might continue the lineage of great midfielders at the Etihad Stadium when he was linked with a move to City earlier in the summer. However, the Blues opted to bring in his England teammate Kalvin Phillips instead.
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