Brighton defeat showed that Man City’s problems run deeper than Rodri

Rodri started his first Premier League match since September 2024 against Brighton on Sunday. Manchester City have desperately missed the Spaniard. Without the 2024 Ballon d’Or winner in central midfield, Pep Guardiola’s team fell apart last season. There was great anticipation about his return to the starting lineup.

Even with Rodri back, though, City suffered many of the same old issues as they allowed a 1-0 lead to slip in a 2-1 defeat to the Seagulls. This was a result and a performance that highlighted how Manchester City’s issues go beyond the Spanish midfielder.

2025 has been a transformational year for the Etihad Stadium outfit. City’s rebuild started in January when they brought in Omar Marmoush, Nico Gonzalez, Abdukodir Khusanov and Vitor Reis. Marmoush hit the ground running, but the other new additions took longer to be integrated. 

This reconstruction continued this summer with Tijani Reijnders, Rayan Cherki and Rayan Ait-Nouri arriving before the start of the Club World Cup. James Trafford returned to Manchester City from Burnley before Gianluigi Donnarumma joined from Paris Saint-Germain, giving Guardiola two new goalkeepers.

Perhaps it was unrealistic to expect Manchester City to completely rebuild their squad in just two transfer windows, but the performance in the loss to Brighton exposed many of the holes that still exist in Guardiola’s team. City aren’t yet in a position to challenge for the Premier League title again.

“We are missing the level,” said Rodri after losing at the Amex Stadium. “It is a matter of the team and the changes. New players have to adapt, and of course, when you change the team that much, it is difficult. This is our reality, it is not for excuses and we have to see that this is not the way to achieve things.

“I do think that we had control of the game and we were not at our best. We did not create our best match but today we should win because we made two big mistakes and counter-attacks. Some of the mistakes we are making are kids’ mistakes. The reality is that we have to raise the level if we want to compete.”

Defensively, Manchester City were vulnerable against Brighton. They lacked the recovery speed to handle the number of runners coming at them from deep, something that was highlighted in the way Brighton scored the winning goal through Brajan Gruda when they had a four-on-one situation in their favour.

On the left side of the defence, Ait-Nouri gives Manchester City some attacking width higher up the pitch. However, this frequently leaves a lot of space behind the Algerian for opponents to exploit. On the right side, neither Rico Lewis nor Matheus Lewis are natural full backs and it has shown.

There have been signs of progress in midfield where Rodri is fit again and Reijnders has settled in quickly following his summer transfer from AC Milan. The Netherlands international was impressive on opening weekend against Wolves, a positive early sign in his gargantuan task to fill the void left by Kevin de Bruyne.

In the attack, though, something isn’t quite clicking. Erling Haaland and Marmoush clearly have individual talent, but the pair have yet to forge an understanding together on the pitch. Marmoush is most comfortable when he can play centrally. However, this robs City of width on the wing. The balance isn’t right yet.

Manchester City boast one of the most talented squads in the Premier League, but from front to back there is a disconnect between the different lines of defence, midfield and attack. This even extends to the goalkeeping position where new signing Donnarumma is an awkward fit for Guardiola’s traditional style of play.

Guardiola signed a new two-year deal to oversee Manchester City’s rebuild and the Etihad Stadium outfit wouldn’t want anyone else doing that job. The Catalan remains one of the best coaches working in the sport today, but he is facing arguably the biggest challenge of his managerial career. The defeat to Brighton made this clear.