Subscribe to our channel: https://goo.gl/pqS0mLThe return of David Silva and Fernandinho helps Manchester City to important win over Southampton. Manchester City have looked unrecognisable over the past week. About as unrecognisable as David Silva with a head of hair again. The Premier League champions toiled without being able to call on Silva or Fernandinho from the start, it becoming increasingly difficult to distinguish how they were attempting to control games in midfield. There lacked a link with the front three, a worrying reliance on individualism; effectively, an antipathy to how Pep Guardiola wants to play the game. His hamstring injury left City bereft of ideas. Fernandinho’s absence left them without their fulcrum: two gaping holes no team in this division could adequately plug in tandem. There remain fitness concerns and a victory down at Southampton will not change the feeling that City are stretched to the maximum ahead of that game on Thursday night, which they prepare for as underdogs. You cannot overlook the defensive mistakes, the difficulties Oleksandr Zinchenko and Danilo suffered, and Guardiola will doubtless fret about the prospect of meeting Liverpool without a recognised left back. Yet this result resembled something of a reboot, City rediscovering an element of zip, a more cohesive unit with arguably their two most important men back. Fernandinho is understated, the sort of quietly dependable character who never forgets to take the bins out. In this case, he is the quietly dependable player who refuses to deviate from his station. That offers City a base they simply do not have otherwise and it became even more blindingly obvious during those ruinous Christmas defeats. Perhaps, in hindsight, Guardiola should have made more of a fuss with the board when they missed out on Jorginho in the summer and insisted on an substitute. None of Fernandinho’s alternatives – Ilkay Gundogan, John Stones or Danilo – are particularly adept at holding a three together. City still insist January will not bring about new signings and Guardiola appears set to muddle on in the hope Fernandinho does not enter the red zone as he did earlier in the month. Little wonder the manager went apoplectic when Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg scythed into the Brazilian late on, a straight red card and the tackle heavy enough for Fernandinho to come off straight away. Apart from his positional sense, there comes added trust when Fernandinho anchors. City are liberated, owning a confidence to take more risks while safe in the knowledge he will happily bail them out otherwise. A failure to create many meaningful opportunities against Crystal Palace and Leicester City was in part a product of defensive insecurity. It is more what he does without the ball but Fernandinho also has no issue gathering possession in tight spaces, as evidenced when he pierced Southampton from his own third after Ederson had diced with disaster inside City’s six-yard box with Zinchenko and Vincent Kompany. One comes with the other where Fernandinho and Silva are concerned. This is their sixth season together, telepathy clear. Silva flourishes with him – scoring the opener, creating four chances, his pass completion touching 90 per cent. He might look like a new man but City realise the value of their old guard.