Marc Cucurella is Manchester City's latest transfer target as Pep Guardiola looks to offset the imminent exit of Oleksandr Zinchenko.
The Ukrainian left-back is set to move to Arsenal for £32million and Guardiola is looking to Brighton's best youngster as his replacement. The English champions have already had a £30m bid rejected for the Spaniard as the Seagulls appear to want at least £50m for him.
City have already had a very busy summer with players joining and leaving. Amongst those to have left the Etihad have been winger Raheem Sterling who made the move to Chelsea for £45m, and Gabriel Jesus who left for Arsenal for £47m. They have brought in two marquee signings in Erling Haaland and Kalvin Phillips. Now, Guardiola could look to bring in another in Cucurella before the season begins.
So if Cucurella does make a move up north, how would Guardiola use him? We simulated the 2022/23 season to find out.
Cucurella's talents prove helpful at City
For this simulation to happen, we used the in-game editor for Football Manager 22 to allow the transfer of Cucurella to Man City at the start of the 2022 summer transfer window.
Taking a look at his in-game attributes, the 23-year-old is capable of paying higher up the pitch and pushing forward, overlapping those playing ahead of him. He's then able to put in great crosses to target those centrally, and can use his excellent vision and passing ability to find those open in space.
His individual stats weren't ground-breaking. Overall, the left-back made 41 appearances across all competitions, including 23 Premier League starts and six Champions League starts, with Guardiola using him as a rotation option.
His only league goal came from an 87th-minute penalty in a 4-0 win over Brentford at home, and his two assists came in the FA Cup final against Leeds and one in a Champions League group stage win.
At the end of the season, FM22 put out the best XI for the City squad, pulling out player statistics, league data, and other metrics to come to a conclusion.
Full City Best XI (4-3-3): Ederson; Walker, Dias, Laporte, Cancelo; Rodri, Foden, De Bruyne; Silva, Grealish, Haaland.
Whilst Cucurella wasn't included in the best XI for City's 2022/23 season, it appears as though he was used by Guardiola as a rotation option. In fact, Cucurella actually started more Premier League games than Cancelo (23 to 20) but Cancelo ultimately made more appearances in other competitions and had a higher average rating (7.30 to 7.01).
City’s 2022/23 season overall from the simulation
In the league, it would be a third consecutive title for City as they finished four points clear of rivals Liverpool to clinch Guardiola's fifth Premier League trophy.
Domestic competitions also went well for City as they took home their seventh Carabao Cup in the last 10 seasons with an extra-time win over Newcastle, with Riyad Mahrez grabbing the winner. Unfortunately, they'd finish as runners-up to Leeds in the FA Cup in a dramatic penalty shootout as Aymeric Laporte missed City's fifth penalty to give the Yorkshire club the win.
In Europe, City made it out of Champions League Group B, topping their group with 16 points ahead of Barcelona, VFL Wolfsburg, and Atalanta. Their first knockout game was against FC Porto who were easily dispatched 5-0 on aggregate. It would take penalties to bring down Paris Saint-Germain after a 0-0 and 1-1 draw over both legs but penalties would ultimately be City's undoing as they lost to Inter Milan after a 2-2 overall draw on aggregate in the semi-finals.
Overall, Cucurella's signing was a big success. Rotation and squad depth are key for Guardiola so picking up Cucurella, whether it's for £50m or less, would be a great piece of business for the defending Premier League champions.
Let us know how much you think Man City should be paying for Cucurella in the comments below!
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