Vincent Kompany needs his best for Manchester City against Chelsea

http://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2015/jan/30/vincent-kompany-manchester-city-chelsea

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The conundrum concerning Vincent Kompany is how the imperious and inspiring displays are mixed with clumsy and sluggish performances that can prove costly for Manchester City. The captain is enduring one of these wobbles as he leads the champions into Stamford Bridge for Saturday’s showdown with Chelsea.

In a contest of multiple subplots, how the central defender performs and marshals his rearguard could prove decisive. A truism of City’s success in the Sheikh Mansour era is that if Kompany plays well the side generally do. On his day there may be no finer footballer in his position in the Premier League yet when the Belgian is poor the Sky Blues suffer.

His previous two games have illustrated this. A fortnight ago City went down 2-0 to Arsenal at the Etihad Stadium with Kompany culpable for the first goal: his dribble upfield ceded possession and when Arsenal counterattacked Kompany compounded the error by fouling Nacho Monreal. Santi Cazorla duly converted the penalty.

Early on in last Saturday’s 2-0 FA Cup home defeat by Middlesbrough Kompany nearly paid again when trying to take the ball from defence, and his inability to steady a shaky rearguard was a concern.

Kompany’s patchy displays have peppered a season in which Manuel Pellegrini’s side have struggled to consistently dominate domestically and on the continent. A Champions League campaign that came close to disaster featured Kompany allowing Roma’s Francesco Totti too much space for the equaliser in a 1-1 draw in September, and he was again part of a lumbering defence that allowed CSKA Moscow to come from two goals down a month later to again share the points.

A big factor here are the eye-watering number of injuries Kompany has suffered since joining City and his admirable keenness to return, often too soon, which means any rustiness is exposed.

Since Mark Hughes signed Kompany he has suffered 25 separate problems, 21 of which have been muscular, the type of injury that makes knowing when being restored to the team safely a tricky call. City insiders say the medical department have to carefully watch Kompany to try to ensure he does not break down again if he comes back too soon.

The displays against Arsenal and Middlesbrough were his first games after being out for more than a month with a calf strain. There was a similar sequence last season when, having missed two months with a thigh strain, Kompany was off the pace in his opening two matches – in December 2013, against West Bromwich Albion and Southampton – and then impressive against Arsenal in the third.

The battle with Chelsea will be game three of Kompany’s latest recovery from injury so the omens are good for him to turn in one of those majestic displays that dispel all doubt.

Pellegrini recognises the pattern. “I think that Vincent returned from a long injury [against Arsenal]. Of course, he needs minutes to be at his best performance. He is a very important player for us and I am sure that this work was very useful also for him. All the games are different and I hope [on Saturday] we are not going to make any mistakes.”

Yet Pellegrini does admit the sheer number of injuries Kompany collects is a worry. “It’s too many injuries, especially muscle and calf injuries. We are trying to study why it happens. There’s a lot of different reasons; it’s very difficult to know exactly what is the major reason.” Diego Costa’s absence may give Kompany one fewer problem but as his fellow central defender Eliaquim Mangala says, the nature of Chelsea’s quick style on the break means he cannot afford to be drawn out of position.

“I think Chelsea will play on the counterattack. We are an attack-minded team and we will not change our style of play,” said the France defender. “We need to play our normal game. We know that Chelsea is a team that likes to defend, is well organised and like to counterattack. They have quality players but we also have a lot of quality players in our squad.

“We go there to get a result. It’s an important game against an important rival for the title. We need to close the gap with Chelsea and the best way to do that is to get a win in Stamford Bridge.”

Much will depend on how Kompany fares.