Strictly speaking, the conflict between De Bruyne and B in the midfield position is actually not serious, and it is far from the point of "if you go up, I can't play". After all, De Bruyne is Manchester City's oldest wave, and Seat B is notoriously good-tempered, both on and off the pitch, the tempers of the two are quite compatible.
When not playing in the midfield, seat B can also be used with De Bruyne, for example, in the 18-19 season, seat B actually adducted a large amount of the right winger, throwing the right corridor to De Bruyne alone, for example, last season seat B and Grealish dominated the control on the wing, allowing De Bruyne to play alone in the middle.
But in terms of the style of the game, the ideas of the two representatives are actually very different. The most typical example, in the 19-20 season, in order to maintain chemistry in the midfield trio of Coach B-Gundogan-Rodri Fernandinho, De Bruyne was arranged by Pep Guardiola to play a false nine: the equivalent of a control center circle, a domination of the attacking third.
This kind of position arrangement actually reflects the style of two people playing in the midfield: De Bruyne, a historic threat to the ball, has no dead ends in passing distance and vision, as long as he is given space to pass, he can always pass the key pass.
But in the area of controlling the rhythm, De Bruyne is actually almost meaningless, after all, if you want to kill with one hit, you have to keep looking for opportunities, and in this process, the team can only be fast and not slow, for the control team, the ball is not at the feet for a long time, it will kill you.
And when the B seat plays in the midfield, Manchester City's midfielder can control the ball - in terms of the loss of Manchester City's midfield this season, this process is indispensable to Rodri and Gundogan's combing, but this kind of work can indeed be done by the B seat, and it is not bad: retreating to receive the ball, resisting with his back, pressing the team's rhythm after turning, and calming the player.
However, while maintaining the rhythm, the creativity of the B seat is actually not strong, and he does not have the ability to finish the opponent in the exchange of stabs. The most typical example, in the 20-21 Champions League final, when De Bruyne entered the sea, seat B could still rely on a retreat to stabilize the midfield, but when it encountered the steel torrent of Chelsea's back five, seat B's passing and shooting could not kill anyone.
From the evaluation of each other by the two people, we can also see that they are all on the same team, and everyone is very clear about each other. In the 'perfect player' model, Bench B opted for De Bruyne's pass, and ahead of last season's Champions League final, De Bruyne had this to say about Bench B: "He's really smart and he understands the game of football really incredible. Although he only has 11 positions on the field, he can play 19 positions. ”
However, even if the conducting style is not compatible, the two have been playing together for six years, and the chemistry between them has never been bad.
After all, one is extremely dependent on space and can do anything with space, and the other is used to creating space for others and is born to do a little bit of everything, as long as you distinguish who controls the midfield, it can be played very well - how dominant Manchester City has been on the right side this season, look at Foden's struggles, you can probably understand it......
In the past two seasons, Manchester City has completed a new generation in the attack, and the talents of Haaland, Alvarez and Doku need not be said to be obvious, and they all have the ability to change the game locally. But for Pep Guardiola, the foundation of the team will always be to control the midfield, and City can only pray for Kevin De Bruyne as he recovers if they want to make a difference this season.