Our owners - next move?

[BillyShears]

I agree with this.

Also, hmm, I dunno tolmie. Manuel brought Villareal to UCL 05/06 semis with a modestly-put-together squad of players so, despite this being a simplistic statement, he should be doing much better with us. There's a multitude of problems I'm sure but the one thing that I see as the bottom line is that things have gone stale, for one reason or another.

I think the worst thing we could do would be to go out and buy 11/12 foreign 25/26 year olds and end up with the same motivational issues we have with the current squad.

I think we need a core of world class players, but we need to supplement them with young players (academy players). I think there'd e a lot more goodwill around for City if the perception wasn't that the entire squad is a group of overpaid mercenaries which Abu Dhabi bought.

There's players coming through who deserve a chance and I would rather next season one or two did and we lost one or two of the big money big name squad players we have who patently don't care enough about the shirt or the cause.

This is bang on - but unfortunately this seems unlikely in the short term as evidenced by the starting 11 v Newcastle in the Captal One Cup. #sad

We shall see in the coming transfer windows. My bet is we'll be much closer to the utopian squad I'd like this time next year.

 

[blue banks]

Need to go back to our previous successful business strategy of targeting the Worlds best players, the cream of the crop - with United not in Europe City is the more appealing choice in Manchester.

Being popular doesn't win trophies - even Barca have their detractors..

All due respect though, not sure how attractive a prospect we are as a potential team for european stars. Not many elite (I'm talking cream of the crop) players would choose us over another club. Harsh, but right now, true.

 

[BlueMoonz1977]

I wouldnt want an overhaul to block the path of any youngsters ready to come through. I also don't think we only need to look at big name, high priced signings. Good players about that don't cost a fortune that could improve our squad. Maybe ine 'marquee' name a season. But I'm looking forward to the club coming good on its vision of bring kids through the academy and into the first team, even if that costs us a few results in the short term.

The answer to that would be for Viera to take the step up

 

[adrianr]

Good post but the question of whether Pellegrini is the right man to rebuild the squad is the wrong one, given that it should be Txiki who is in charge of that anyway, the whole point being we're not tied to a certain set of players only working under a certain manager.

It's also another reason people shouldn't be so quick to criticise Pellegrini or Mancini, the latter as you rightly point out knew this team still needed huge investment to make proper inroads in Europe. Say what you like about what a nasty man he was, he bloody well knew his football. Pellegrini may be happier to get on with what he's been given, but also as you say, shouldn't be made the patsy for sub-par players incapable or unwilling to play like professional footballers.

That in mind,

1) I was under the impression given our new financial standing that this would no longer be an issue. We should be able to spend plenty to fix the squad without pissing everyone off, but ultimate if the choice is a world class football team or delaying UEFA coming up with a new arbitrary set of rules to punish us by, I'd suggest the former is the way to go.

2) Of course. The coaches you could say are a definitive cut above Pellegrini you can count on one hand - The man contrary to more recent belief is not an idiot. I'd love to see Pep here, just to see if the forum would still demand him out at the first sign of trouble, because rest assured no-one is going to come in and win everything all the time. There's a niggling worry that in Mancini and Pellegrini we've still never had a 'Tier 1' manager like Pep or Ancelotti, but even they will fall foul if they're given players who won't try. They're football managers, not miracle workers.

3) They have to decide who's opinion is more important, the establishment or the public. Because in trying to appease the establishment you can be damn sure we're the European laughing stock of the public. People were talking before our group how it was daft that the English champions were in with the German champions, and yet here we are on course to finish bottom of the group again, all because we tried to keep a few wannabe dictators happy by slipping over the draw bridge before it was raised. We should have been pushing for proper fairness from the start, not hoping they would let us into the gang and we could stick two fingers up to everyone else.

 

[kunaguero10]

Don't know what the answer is Tolm

But our transfer business over the last few seasons is leaving a lot to be desired

Fernandinho
Negredo
Navas
Demichelis
Jovetic
Mangala
Fernando
Garcia
Nastasic
Sinclair

I know we have had FFP restrictions, but the above is £150 million worth of players and not one of them has improved the first team

We are still living off the players we brought in 4 - 5 seasons ago

Hart
Zabba
Kompany
Yaya
Silva
Aguero

Those above are our first names on the teamsheet, that for me is the main concern

We have everything in place at the club, great facilities, decent directors, top chairman, top owner, great commercial deals, but how long do we have to wait before we have the management and playing staff to match the ambitions of the club

The vast majority of those signings were made under Txiki, perhaps its him who is also the problem?

bingo

 

[bobmcfc]

Spend what we need on who we need a tell Platini to shove it up his arse and ban us !! Adhering has done more harm to us than we could ever benefit in good graces from The UEFA cronies. Let them ban us ? It's better than turning shit and not qualifying anyway because we have let them tether us

 

[MeatHunterrr]

Don't know what the answer is Tolm

But our transfer business over the last few seasons is leaving a lot to be desired

Fernandinho
Negredo
Navas
Demichelis
Jovetic
Mangala
Fernando
Garcia
Nastasic
Sinclair

I know we have had FFP restrictions, but the above is £150 million worth of players and not one of them has improved the first team

We are still living off the players we brought in 4 - 5 seasons ago

Hart
Zabba
Kompany
Yaya
Silva
Aguero

Those above are our first names on the teamsheet, that for me is the main concern

We have everything in place at the club, great facilities, decent directors, top chairman, top owner, great commercial deals, but how long do we have to wait before we have the management and playing staff to match the ambitions of the club

The vast majority of those signings were made under Txiki, perhaps its him who is also the problem?

bingo

Then again that said, the board sanctions the signings. DoF gives his suggestions and then board approves it. Its not like board gives him pot of money and let DoF spend it on whoever he likes.

My point is, singing players are teamwork and the whole board should be responsible, not just one person.

 

[St Helens Blue (Exiled)]

Just sack the manager. Its not rocket science.

Naive in the extreme

Naivity is burying your head in the sand mate.
It may be to you Nip but do you or anyone on this board actually think our CEO,Chairman,Owner are going to be happy with this champions league campaign. He is a gonner whatever we do this season and if anyone wants a small wager that he wont be manager next season then bring it on.
It has been an unmitigating disaster it really has.

 

[BillyShears]

Good post but the question of whether Pellegrini is the right man to rebuild the squad is the wrong one, given that it should be Txiki who is in charge of that anyway, the whole point being we're not tied to a certain set of players only working under a certain manager.

It's also another reason people shouldn't be so quick to criticise Pellegrini or Mancini, the latter as you rightly point out knew this team still needed huge investment to make proper inroads in Europe. Say what you like about what a nasty man he was, he bloody well knew his football. Pellegrini may be happier to get on with what he's been given, but also as you say, shouldn't be made the patsy for sub-par players incapable or unwilling to play like professional footballers.

That in mind,

1) I was under the impression given our new financial standing that this would no longer be an issue. We should be able to spend plenty to fix the squad without pissing everyone off, but ultimate if the choice is a world class football team or delaying UEFA coming up with a new arbitrary set of rules to punish us by, I'd suggest the former is the way to go.

2) Of course. The coaches you could say are a definitive cut above Pellegrini you can count on one hand - The man contrary to more recent belief is not an idiot. I'd love to see Pep here, just to see if the forum would still demand him out at the first sign of trouble, because rest assured no-one is going to come in and win everything all the time. There's a niggling worry that in Mancini and Pellegrini we've still never had a 'Tier 1' manager like Pep or Ancelotti, but even they will fall foul if they're given players who won't try. They're football managers, not miracle workers.

3) They have to decide who's opinion is more important, the establishment or the public. Because in trying to appease the establishment you can be damn sure we're the European laughing stock of the public. People were talking before our group how it was daft that the English champions were in with the German champions, and yet here we are on course to finish bottom of the group again, all because we tried to keep a few wannabe dictators happy by slipping over the draw bridge before it was raised. We should have been pushing for proper fairness from the start, not hoping they would let us into the gang and we could stick two fingers up to everyone else.

I feel much saner and much better reading posts like this.

Good to see in amongst the usual knee jerk crap there's a lot of well thought out and rational responses to what the future holds and requires.

On point 3, there's something which I think we cannot ignore. Look at what simply having Lampard play a few games did for our media coverage. The post Chelsea love in was unbelievable. It's my firm belief that to win hearts and minds, we need the next crop of ENGLISH talent in our squad. It's a reality which United and Chelsea have been aware of and very good at for a decade know. Understanding that that English core helps shape the narrative. We really need that. Barkley, Clyne, Ward Prose, even Rodriquez. All of them I'd take in a heartbeat and let Toure, Sagna, Jovetic, and Navas go.

Bayern do it with German players. Barca/Madrid with Spanish players. We let Luke Shaw go to the rags, Chambers to Arsenal. We need to look at this.

 

[EalingBlue2]

Incredible thread,if it was just a pr exercise for Abu dhabi than they would have never invested so heavily on the academy
As per ffp were better of taking ffp to court rather than over spending or breaking the rules,as thode who brought ffp will be ready to gang up against us but that being said we won't have ffp to deal with in future
And we need to and we will be over hauling the squad by next season,it sucks to be at the losing end of games but we have to remain hopeful for the future as we have plenty of reasons to be
Sometimes bm makes matter worse after a bad result

I hate to tell you it is 100% a PR exercise for Abu dhabi and having the world best academy and showing the world that they can replicate Barcelona and nurture the best young players in the world to build a long term dynasty is absolutely key to that!!!!!! This is all about positioning Abu dhabi across the world as a centre of long term excellence to encourage investment, it is to help open doors, it is to facilitate Emirati business etc

Throwing big bucks for short term success is almost the antithesis of the strategy but that said so is short term failure.