Thread by @CitysVeins, My thoughts on City’s recruitment strategy since Pep arrived. Thread: I want [...]

My thoughts on City’s recruitment strategy since Pep arrived. Thread:

I want to start by making on thing clear, City’s recruitment over the last 5 years has been close to perfect. 8 domestic trophies in 4 seasons proves that. For all the criticism we get, almost 30 players have left in this period, balancing the books.

So what exactly is our recruitment strategy? In layman terms, we have gone for good players with huge potential U25. Players that everyone knows are good but not everyone is chasing. This gives us leverage with fee negotiations. There are tons of examples for this:

Sterling, Sané, Jesus, Ederson, Bernardo, Laporte etc. You never see us going for the blockbuster signings like Bale to Real, Pogba to United or Neymar to PSG. We steer clear from those.

Let’s look at the fee for some of our players and their age at the time of signing.

Sterling - 20 yrs / £49m
Sané - 20 yrs / £37m
Jesus - 19 yrs / £27m
Ederson - 23 yrs / £35m
Bernardo - 22 yrs / £43m
Laporte - 23 yrs / £57m
KDB - 24 yrs / £55m
Gundogan - 25 yrs / £20m

Mendy - 23 yrs / £52m
Stones - 22 yrs / £50m
Rodri - 23 yrs / £62m
Zinchenko - 19 yrs / £1.7m
Aké - 25 yrs / £41m
Ferran - 20 yrs / £21m
Dias - 23 yrs / £62m

13/15 of these signings were U24 when signed. Judging by this, we can make a strong conclusion that City have a clear strategy and know what they are doing and the results speak for themselves. This is a team that spends wisely with a long term plan in mind.

So where did it start going wrong? Two reasons. 1) Senior players leaving. 2) Liverpool.

Let’s start with the first one, when players like Vinny, Otamendi, Silva, Bravo and Sané leave your club within the space of two seasons, it’s leaves a big hole in the squad.

These players have been with us for at least 4 seasons each and have 1212 apps for City combined. That’s far too much experience gone in a very short period of time. So what do you do? You obviously need to replace them.

The club took 12 months to replace Kompany with Dias. Otamendi has been replaced with Aké. Silva? Some say it’s Foden but only time will tell. Ferran has been brought in to replace Sané.

The second problem is Liverpool.
Our recruitment strategy has worked really well and could still work if this Liverpool side didn’t exist. You simply can’t keep signing young players with potential with these guys around.

Let’s look at their signings. VVD and Alisson. VVD was brought in for £75m at the age of 26. When was the last time spent £75m or even signed a 26 yr old? Alisson was signed for £67m at the age of 25. Two players that transformed their club.

This summer? They signed 29 yr old Thiago for just £30m. Their recruitment strategy is simple, spend big on few very good players that will impact the squad immediately.

As we saw earlier, Dias, Ferran and Aké aren’t really additions to the squad but rather replacements for players that have left. Which means, we haven’t really strengthened our squad at all. We have stagnated.

There were clear weaknesses when the window opened

- Aguero has shown signs of decline + was injured for almost 4 months
- Fernandinho is 35 and Gundogan has shown over and over again that he’s not good enough
- Mendy and Zinchenko can’t stay fit and aren’t good enough

The team desperately needed a new LB, ST and midfielder. Unfortunately, just like in previous seasons, we went for a young player with potential by signing Ferran instead of a player that can have immediate impact. Aké wasn’t the best signing either considering the options we had

Instead of getting those two, we should’ve splashed out on Koulibaly. A world class CB that will transform our backline like VVD for Liverpool. £75m? Why not? We’ve barley spent last 2 windows despite our success and so many players are leaving. The money is there.

In midfield, we had a wonderful opportunity to get Thiago for just £30m. He’ll have been able to cover the hole left by Silva as well as shred some mins off Fernandinho. Imagine a midfield of Thiago, KDB and Rodri.

Moving to ST. This ones tricky, unless the club has some plans for Halland or someone else like Felix in the future. We should’ve got Werner this season. Aguero turns 33 next summer, whether he stays or not a replacement should’ve been signed this window.

Last but not least LB, Alaba would’ve been a dream signing for peanuts like Thiago although his wages were gonna be high (we were going for Messi who cares) but a good cheap alternative would’ve been Tagliafico.

Another option could’ve easily been Angelino who enjoyed good form last season with RB Leipzig. There were so many things that we could’ve done to solve the LB situation.

OUT

Sane
Silva
Bravo
Otamendi
Angelino
Zinchenko
Some academy players

IN

Steffen
Dias
Koulibaly
Thiago
Tagliafico
Werner

Net spend of roughly £110m.

Before Pep, we used sign older players like Negredo, Sagna, Demichelis, Willy and even Fernandinho. But by the time Peo arrived, the squad was too old. In an attempt to make it younger quickly, we’ve shifted to the extreme opposite. Signing only young players.

I believe in order to challenge for the title again, we need to find that balance and start making signings that will improve the team immediately. End of thread.

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