Manchester City secured their place in the Champions League knockout stages with a 0-0 draw against Porto on Tuesday night but Pep Guardiola will still surely be frustrated that his side weren’t able to secure a win in Portugal.
His side’s profligacy in front of goal was perhaps the main reason why the Citizens weren’t able to earn all three points, with Ferran Torres one of the main culprits.
The Spanish winger, who joined from Valencia during the summer, endured a terrible night at Estadio do Dragao, which may convince Guardiola that the youngster shouldn’t be played as a striker again in future matches.
As per SofaScore, Torres earned a 6.5 rating for his display, with only Raheem Sterling rated lower of the Manchester City players who started the game.
During his time on the pitch, which totalled 71 minutes, he had just 15 touches of the ball and could complete just five out of nine passes, suggesting that the game completely passed him by and he was able to have very little impact.
However, he was still able to miss one big chance and lose possession five times during the game meaning that the few times he did have the ball, he was extremely wasteful with it.
It was no surprise therefore that Guardiola substituted Torres with around 20 minutes remaining, and his replacement Gabriel Jesus was able to have a much more telling influence on the game, having just two fewer touches than the Spaniard did, despite being on the pitch for significantly less time.
The Brazilian also saw a late goal disallowed due to a VAR offside call but looked dangerous when he came on, which may be enough to suggest that he should start ahead of Torres up front in future matches.
You can understand why Guardiola opted to start the 20-year-old, after his impressive performance in the reverse fixture, which led to him praising his performance in the 3-1 win, saying:
“It was an incredible combination from Phil [Foden] and Ferran [Torres].
“Ferran has an incredible sense of goal. The most satisfying thing was the way they came in. Always the people who come from the bench are so important.”
The £40.5 million-rated Spanish international will have to put in a much-improved performance next time out if he wants to keep his place in Guardiola’s side, however, with the Citizens set to face struggling Fulham at home on Saturday.
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