Sergio Aguero is a frustrating striker for Manchester City fans. He’s ridiculously good when he’s on form, but he just isn’t on form all that often. Injuries have often been to blame, but that doesn’t make him any less inconsistent.
Comments on Aguero’s quality are inevitably followed by “…when he’s healthy,” and for good reason. Last year in the Premier League he scored 14 goals in City’s first 15 games. That's a rate of a goal every 76 minutes. Then he got injured in December and wasn’t quite the same. When he returned he finished out the season by scoring 12 goals in 18 games, which is still good, but Sergio Aguero didn’t make his name by being “good;” he’s exceptional, and scoring at a rate of a goal every 124 minutes) falls short of that superlative.
This year he has yet to regain the red hot form he had at this time last year. And that failure was highlighted by a single sequence during Manchester City’s Champions League match against Borussia Mönchengladbach on Wednesday.
After successfully defending a corner, Manchester City secured the ball via Joe Hart. Hart then proceeded to complete what is nothing less than the pass of the year so far. He side-foot drop kicked the ball a good 70 yards to a streaking Aguero and hit him perfectly in stride.
The pass begged to be finished — to do otherwise was practically insulting, a rude rejection of defense splitting hospitality — and Aguero lined up his body as he had done a hundred times before to do just that. But…
…he missed.
Aguero was left in disbelief, and for the life of me I can’t decide if he is more shocked that he had a chance to score at all or that he missed such a clear cut opportunity; Hart’s pass was that good, and Aguero’s miss was that bad.
There is no telling when Aguero is going to regain his form or when he will get injured again. I just hope that the former happens sooner rather than later and the latter stays on the other side of never.
Fortunately for Aguero, he went on to score the game winning penalty in the 90th minute. He clearly still has the ability to perform under pressure, but scoring a penalty is a far cry from the kind of world beating performance that Aguero is capable of.
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