With Ashton Gate full to bursting it was fitting that the press conference room inside the bowels of the Lansdown Stand was standing room only as Pep Guardiola strode in to deliver his post-match debrief.
There was an early carrot for local journalists as the Manchester City manager noted that Bristol City midfielder Alex Scott was “unbelievable”, without expanding on the adjective, but with so much national attention present the focus of the conversation was, frustratingly understandably, on the Premier League club: Kevin De Bruyne’s return to fitness, Kalvin Phillips’ performance, the travelling support.
Bristol-based media were afforded one question at the end as the BBC’s Damian Derrick, dangling a Scott-sized worm for the Catalan, asked: “what did you think of Bristol City’s performance and was there a player who stood out for you?”
The response was fulsome but also a little surprising. As we were anticipating an ode to the Robins No7 and his technical qualities, he namechecked him again, of course, but not before recognising the performance of a fellow midfielder in red and white. Admittedly, it was simply by bringing up his name attached with the observation that he's a "really good player", but if you had Matty James on your Pep’s first piece of praise bingo card, you’re a wiser person than most.
There’s no doubting the 31-year-old had a fine game in the middle of the park but James remains, as he has been throughout his time at Ashton Gate, a perennially underrated and under-appreciated individual in terms of his importance to this team.
Now, that line in itself is a little bit cliché, because when you talk about underrated footballers, nine times out of 10 they tend to be defensive midfielders going about their business with understated efficiency, to the point you only really notice them in the line of duty when they make an error.
And James very much fits such a description. It’s meant in the nicest possible terms but he is a bit of a boring player, at least in conventional terms. There’s no obvious attacking threat, he puts himself about in a defensive sense but rarely does he thunder into a slide tackle ala Joe Williams and his passing tends to be on the conservative side; there are no raking 50-yard cross-field balls.
He plays with a certain sensibility that doesn’t always conform to the modern conception of what enjoyable football is. He certainly doesn’t make too many highlights packages or social media compilations.
He can go relatively unnoticed over the course of 90 minutes, save for his set-piece taking which is often the only obvious signifier people have for the strength of his performance. “Did he beat the first man? Yes, well played Matty James”; “it was headed clear? Useless, what’s he doing?”
We joke, but there is some degree of truth to that. And, a confession from the press box, often when doing player ratings we’re convinced we can almost copy and paste the words from previous performances about him, such is the jarring consistency in what he does on the pitch. (For the record, we don’t engage in such self-plagiarism, you can check, it’s just to emphasise a point).
He’s like watching an episode of Midsomer Murders - it seems like the same thing is essentially happening, every single time, just some of the cast and the locations are different.
But that shouldn’t be seen as lampooning James, far from it, it’s precisely why he retains his charm and the reason Nigel Pearson is so fond of him, as a performer and a professional. There has to be a sense of reassurance every time you select a team that specific individuals are going to give you, at base level, reliability. Their ceiling may not be as high as others, but neither is their floor as low, and they can mitigate against the natural inconsistencies within players elsewhere in the team.
That is significant from a Bristol City perspective because, as we know, throughout his time at the club, James - as one of only 10 permanent signings Pearson has made over four transfer windows - has been increasingly surrounded by academy players or professionals still largely in the early stages of their career.
The lack of financial resource available to the manager has meant he has had to lean on the academy and while the talent within the club is evident, it can’t always be transferred to a first-team environment without the presence of someone like James.
On the field, he sticks to the game plan and the manager’s instructions. Off the pitch, and on the training ground, he symbolises the culture that the manager wants to instil in each new face as they make the step up from the U21s to the senior squad. They follow his lead, whether they’re a central midfielder, left-back, goalkeeper, whatever.
You have to accept that when you play young players they can leap from one game to the next with huge variations in their output and influence on the contest. Amid that you need a Matty James to level things out, to play his game how he always does to help others do the same.
The Manchester City cup tie was an interesting case in point as Max O’Leary, George Tanner, Zak Vyner, Cam Pring, Joe Williams, Scott, Bell and Mark Sykes all played in probably the best, or at least most high-profile, games of their careers and although they’re of suitable character where they can mind their own game, they would still look to James as an assuring presence on the field and in the dressing room.
His match statistics don’t scream midfield domination, but then they don’t need to, because they also show a sliver of what he’s all about. Only Tomas Kalas, and curiously Sam Bell, passed the ball with greater efficiency than his 84.2 per cent. And in the case of the former he ultimately received a lot of possession in safe areas while the latter only attempted eight passes over the course of the game.
James was there, in the thick of it, with an England, Portugal and/or Belgian international bearing down on him with every possession, yet only six times did he not find a teammate.
The importance of that in such an environment cannot be overstated because City knew they were going to receive little of the ball, that when they did have it, they had to protect it. Likewise, on the occasions when you do get hold of it, it’s a huge help for collective energy levels when you can make the opposition run for a bit rather than surrendering the ball straight away.
No City player completed more tackles than his three, either, as he did his utmost to protect the area in front of the defence, often forcing the Premier League side into wider channels than they wanted to occupy.
But those numbers tell only a basic tale because the guiding principle for James is space and his ability to find it at all times. Much like when a striker runs off the shoulder into a vacant area to demand the ball, James can do so but on a much smaller scale to assist a teammate in possession with an out-ball or to then progress a move on, knowing that his next pass will get the Robins further up the pitch.
Similarly he’s adept at finding the space to squeeze the opposition in possession and has a knack of knowing where the second ball is going to be, enabling him to, at the very least, pressure a mistake or, best-case scenario, win it back altogether to set his team on the attacking transitions that Guardiola confessed his team struggled to combat in the first half.
He’s not a destructive midfielder in the Phillips-mould (with his performance for Leeds United at Ashton Gate in March 2019 a lesson in performing so) but is slightly more methodical as he doesn’t have the same explosive athleticism, at least not anymore, but relies on his football IQ in terms of analysing and assessing any danger before reacting accordingly.
When James signed in the summer of 2021 on a three-year contract it was on the back of an encouraging campaign on loan at Coventry City after a long period of injury issues but was viewed as a little excessive given the potential pitfalls around his durability; ultimately, how much value were City going to get over that period?
Since his debut he’s made 62 appearances and having played 2,783 minutes last season - his most since the 2013/14 campaign when he was 22 - he’s on pace to exceed that figure in 2022/23.
There have been two injuries and it’s not by coincidence that those periods out of the team coincided with the midfield lacking a consistent sense of structure and reliability. The fact he played every minute of the 12-game unbeaten run, ended in midweek by Manchester City, also tells a story.
His modest performances and persona over the last 18 months followed by this slightly surprising - to some, anyway - piece of recognition from one of the foremost elite managers in world football over the last 15 years (a James-ish type player for Spain and Barcelona in his day) is symbolic as he’s existed in tandem with City’s own progress as a team under Pearson.
But as City have been on an upward trajectory and individuals have improved over time to enhance the collective, James has kind of stayed the same, doing what’s asked of him with no frills and not requiring or desiring the approval of the gallery to perform his job. And that’s precisely why he should be celebrated.
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