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Manchester Evening News
Manchester Evening News
Sport
Jake Stokes & Alex Brotherton

Bernardo Silva joins Riyad Mahrez in elite class to hand Pep Guardiola 'brilliant' secret weapon

Manchester City are slowly transforming into football's edition of Norway at 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics - Pep Guardiola's side are just hoovering up gold medal after another.

Well, that's if we're appointing ourselves as our own IOC. Riyad Mahrez is unquestionably top of the Premier League podium when it comes to his velvet first touch.

Bernardo Silva also showed he might be better at one particular skill than anyone else in his man-of-the-match slaying of Sporting Lisbon.

The City is Ours team of Dom Farrell and Alex Brotherton spoke on the Manchester Evening News' latest Facebook live reacting to Bernardo's masterclass in Tuesday's 5-0 win.

Alex kickstarted the discussion by lauding the 27-year-old for his spectacular half-volley, mulling whether it was even better than his goal-of-the-season contender against Aston Villa.

AB: "Okay, there isn't much build-up, it's a cross from a corner but the actual technique of the strike I think is better than his volley at Villa Park.

"That's not to say that the Villa goal wasn't extremely difficult - hitting a ball first-time from a cross like that with such an accurate strike really hard. But with this one, you can never underestimate how hard it is hitting a half-volley accurately.

"That technique is so difficult and I can't think of any players who have scored two such brilliant goals in the space of two to three months."

After Dom delved back into history to put forward the case of Tony Yeboah, Alex (who does not remember the Leeds United cult hero) continued by adding how Guardiola can now arm City with another gold medal in their strike force, lauding the Portuguese playmaker for his outrageous technique.

AB: "We often talk about how Mahrez perhaps has the best first touch in the Premier League but you could count Bernardo as having the best first-time finish as well. It's just an incredible goal."

Follow our City Is Ours trends writer Jake Stokes on Twitter to get involved in the discussion and give us your thoughts in the comments section below.

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