Man City wing pair might threaten Pep Guardiola season prediction

After casually slicing Sporting to pieces, Riyad Mahrez and Raheem Sterling decided to warm down on Wednesday by trying to take lumps out of each other on the table tennis table.

It didn't quite reach the intensity of Bernardo Silva's head-tennis match with Jack Grealish a few weeks ago but still involved two Manchester City players at the top of their game seeking the bragging rights; they were brothers on the pitch in Lisbon, but they are always competing with each other for a spot in the team.

There are probably a few players ahead of them in the Player of the Year running, but it is hard to argue with the numbers Mahrez and Sterling are producing at the moment.

Mahrez's calm finish at the Estadio Jose Alvalade took him to 17 for the season in all competitions, meaning he needs just one more from the final third of the season to best Ilkay Gundogan's tally as top scorer last year. The Algerian has nine goals in his last nine appearances, scoring in eight of them, and is more of a guarantee of goals than Pep Guardiola expected.

Attempting to catch him up is Sterling. The 27-year-old is four behind on 13, but has 12 in his last 17 club appearances after only managing two in his previous 27. It still feels like the player doesn't get the credit he deserves for his goalscoring ability, despite moving into tenth place in City's all-time records with his brilliant finish against Sporting. At some point, it really has to be accepted without a 'but' that he is one of the best in the world at scoring goals.

As Guardiola said about Bernardo after the game, top players score the goals to win the games on top of everything is. For all goalscoring isn't everything, sometimes it really is and Mahrez and Sterling are currently best