Manchester City: Transfer News and Rumour Roundup 9

Manchester City signing news and rumours all in one relatively convenient place, with commentary and opinions thrown in for good measure.

Remember what the football transfer window was like before the internet came along? It was a simpler time, with simpler pleasures. The local rag, be it the Sun, Star, Mirror or Mail, would gleefully report that Manchester City were in line to sign a picked-out-of-a-hat superstar from South America and were it not for common sense, it would be perfectly believable. Nothing like today in which the young kids are accessing media from all over the world, analysing a player’s every tweet to the n’th degree and tracking his holiday flight’s plane to see if it makes a stop-over in Manchester.

It’s all different now and, somehow, we are more informed but less satisfied. City’s targeting Leroy Sane, they told us months ago. Now we just want it out of the way and over with. Announce Gundogan, Ilkay Gundogan tweeted to the official Manchester City twitter account, mimicking the many fans who had sent the exact same for weeks. We now not only need to know something’s happening, we need it to happen right away just to be convinced.

The truth is, for all the rumours flying around, City already have made the best and most impactful signing of the summer long ago – Pep Guardiola. This isn’t a case, most classically seen with Arsenal, where every player returning from injury is counted by a beleaguered fan-base as being “like a new signing”. If any coach in the world can be suggested to be able to get the best out of players, it’s Pep.

Nonetheless, Guardiola wasn’t brought in to fix Raheem Sterling, though doubtless he’ll help, he’s here to take the Blues to the next level. A global brand with a permanent seat at the big boys table on the local and international scene, a perennial contender and well-oiled machine that runs on continued success for years to come. To do this, a massive change of the guard is required.

And thus we are back to signings and, while nothing is confirmed since our last update, there’s still plenty of buzz and a few that are just outside the door waiting to get in. So while nothing is 100% sure, it’s pretty close and for now we’ll all have to make do with that while we plug on with our “Announce Player” tweets to the official account.

Click the button and let’s get started…

Next: The Difficult Decision