What Elano says to his Brazilian team mates or not getting into Europe is not going to affect City's standing in world football one little bit. The thing that will stop City attracting top, top players will simply be the fact that at the moment we aren't on a par with United, Liverpool, Barca, Madrid, Milan, et al. If you were Kaka or Villa and your choices were City/Madrid or City/Milan what would you choose?
On another point is this the same Elano who wants to sign a contract extension when he still has 2 years on his current one?