Player Focus: Old Fashioned Otamendi Approach Adds Brawn to City Backline

About a month after Nicolas Otamendi arrived in England, and after a few understandable initial issues adjusting, the Manchester City centre-half enthused about the nature of the Premier League.

“It’s the type of football that I’ve always enjoyed and always appreciated,” the Argentine said. “When you come here you really do start to enjoy your football even more.

“I like the fact that it’s so competitive here… it forces you as a player to give 100% in every game because of that fierce competition that there is. I’m certainly enjoying the challenge.”

It is fair to say opposition strikers don’t so much enjoy playing against Otamendi. They know they’re going to be in for a proper physical battle, of the type that isn't so regular in the game these days.

In that regard, the 27-year-old is further evidence of Arsene Wenger’s theory that South America is still the only place in world football producing properly old-fashioned aggressive defenders and centre forwards - partly because they still get to come up against each other, and partly because they don’t go through the more sanitised coaching that has become so commonplace in Europe. There’s still a combative rawness to their approaches. It says much that Otamendi himself grows a beard because he thinks it makes him look more fearsome, less forgiving.

That was made clear at this summer’s Copa America, and has become even more apparent during his time in England.

So much of Otamendi’s game is reminiscent of Fabio Cannavaro, the centre-half who typified that dominant style of defending a decade ago. He is so determined to just get any kind of touch to disrupt an opposition player, and is unwilling to give an inch.

Usually, he takes a lot more than an inch, abrasively shutting strikers down with the sheer force of his challenges. That can be seen in his stats.

No centre-back has made more tackles per game in the Premier League, at 3.3, which is level with Newcastle United’s Chancel Mbemba. The big difference, of course, is that Mbemba usually has a lot more defending to do. Beyond that, Otamendi is ninth for interceptions among centre-halves, at 2.7; and eighth for fouls, at 1 per game. Moreover he leads the way for City in both clearances (7.3) and aerial duels won per game (3.6).

Basically, the Argentine is very high across the board for all the old-fashioned defensive attributes, and there’s a strong argument that Pellegrini’s probably needed that. He has started to erode some of of the slight laxness and fragility that enters their game when the attackers are not fully on it, as was a conspicuous feature of their somewhat idiosyncratic 2013/14 title win.

There was a glimpse of it in the 4-1 defeat at Tottenham Hotspur, in which Otamendi was still getting used to a different league and had a difficult game, but his adjustment since then has been rapid. It also allowed City to play a very different type of game, one in which they could finally lean on defence when their attack wasn't working, in the 0-0 draw at Manchester United.

It’s also not like his centre-half’s malevolence mitigates against the technical side of his game. City haven’t exactly been affected in that regard because he’s in the team. Otamendi plays the fifth highest passes per game in the league - at 64.3, and only behind midfielders Santi Cazorla, Cesc Fabregas, Andrew Surman and Fernandinho - but still has a completion percentage of 86.7%, higher than Fabregas and Surman.

Ultimately, Otamendi is what City have been missing. He may not be as rampaging or as proactive as Vincent Kompany, but he gives less away while also offering the team more of the Belgian’s abrasiveness. City’s defence will just be much harder to push around with the Argentine on the pitch. He can help push them on to another level.

How impressed have you been with Otamendi's progress at City this season? Let us know in the comments below