I agree with some of your points and don't with others.
We haven't signed a marquee player ala Neymar, Mbappe etc because of the fees attached to those deals. It isn't reputation that got those deals done, it was the fees. Neymar, Mbappe, Felix, Pogba, Ronaldo etc all moved for more than our record fee and it wasn't a case of rejecting us due to our reputation.
Raiola will not ask for a wage that ruins our structure. Our top earner is KDB and, given his new deal, will likely exceed 350k, a figure Haaland cannot command at any club. The case of Haaland is very unique and it's because of that gives us an advantage. The desire of Haaland has always been to play in England as per his father. He grew up in Leeds, supported them as well as City and Forest and is fluent in the language. Because of that, there is a clear connection to play in England that you don't see in South American players who tend to want the move to RM or Barca. In terms of sporting projects in England that could attract Haaland, it is only Liverpool and ourselves that can truly be viable contenders.
I think you place way too much stock in 'reputation'. The first consideration of any top level player is sporting project. It is the reason Messi wants City, players want the best chance of winning trophies and improving their own legacies and branding henceforth. Liverpool have a much stronger reputation than we do but have never brought in an elite marquee level player. Reputation isn't the reason why, it is to do with the structure of the club and the financial realities that they choose to deal with.
I don't buy into the idea that we'd be some sort of stepping stone for Haaland. Verratti, a Raiola client, has stayed at PSG for years now without any rumours of him leaving. We have never lost a top first team player that we wanted to keep bar Sane. In that case, it was the biggest team in Sane's country and there were reports on how torn Sane was over the move for a long while.
Cheers for the response.
I hear you and want to believe his time here as a young lad means enough. Am I confident that can trump other variables? Not really.
Why? I’ll try to explain a bit better if I can.
I think you may be underestimating the way many young professional athletes of the highest tier today are often deeply ingrained in the concept of making their “brand.” It’s a generational difference in attitudes about tribalism an loyalty that came from realizing many talented players can have short careers where agents and sport player unions have come to show them that the clubs and even fans at times, don’t often care about the players because of the cut throat nature of the game.
To both protect and better distribute larger shares of the wealth the club owners enjoy the agents and player unions (here in the States) I understand train players in this and teach them it needs to be about them for themselves and their peers. There is reason to accept this logic if you ask me as clubs and fans will turn on a player if they don’t perform enough, but then demand loyalty of players when they do well, not accepting free-market capitalism when it comes to them as a behavior normal workers would all take advantage of in other professions.
This also leads to things like seeing Stones and Maguire hugging and smiling after yesterday and as fans ridicule them the players do it anyway. Why?I believe in part the players “union” in this case means it is them somewhat verses the clubs and sometimes the fans who can be very harsh, nasty and quite fair weather if you haven’t “proven” yourself to them even if the conclusion was unfairly come to.
What this means is that the concept of loyalty to clubs, where you come from, etc. does not mean the same as they have been taught from athletes also in other professions and agents, like the NBA who have players who love football, and vice versa (see the London NBA game last year with many big PL players in attendance).
This is a very long winded way of saying I think Haaland comes across to me as that kind of player. He has Raiola as his agent. That tells me something, and that doesn’t mean Raiola is bad for him.
When he went to Dortmund his father and he were careful and calculating about choosing with Raiola Dortmund over United.
I believe Raiola, Haaland and his father are looking to maximise his brand and likelihood of reaching the top level as a global megastar footballer.
This is why club reputation matters.
Sure, we can overpay and keep things somewhat within the wage structure, somehow, but I am not sure if this will be enough as the truth is playing for City, we are not as known of a club to casual football supporters or non-football fans.
If he’s a different personality than that would be a welcome surprise, but Haaland strikes me as a highly ambitious, “build your brand” oriented player (Neymar, Mbappe, Sancho, Pogba) where going to City now isn’t going to be the best choice for his career, given what I wrote above. Maybe coming back to Manchester later on when he’s older would be a nice feel good story to help his brand going.
