The Unlucky Dozen: Manchester City and the 25 player rule
The Unlucky Dozen: Manchester City and the 25 player rule
Oh dear oh dear oh dear. Oh dear. What were Manchester City thinking? That seems to be the general consensus at the moment, with their continued ignorance of the 25 player rule. Their insistence on continued new player recruitment when their current squad sits at 37 names is a bafflement to all.
As you all know, the Premier League has introduced a new rule that limits match-day squads to be picked from the submitted squad list of only 25 players. So what then, for the unlucky dozen?
Speaking to Sky Sports News after last night’s 2-1 defeat to New York Red Bulls, Mancini insisted he didn’t know the identity of which of his stars would be sold.
“We must do a list with 25 players. For this, I think that some players remain out of the list and for them it’s better that they leave the club,” Mancini revealed.
“We are not sure whether it’ll be [Craig] Bellamy, [Michael] Johnson, [Nigel] De Jong it is impossible now to know which players will be on the list.”
Pretty gauling for the players you’d have thought, and a pretty bad way to demotivate anyone likely to make the list, and leave large parts of your squad quite unhappy. Additionally, it may only serve to deter future signings as they know if they don’t hit the ground running they’ll simply be replaced on a whim or left to rot after not being named on the squad list; similarly with their youngsters, the chance of a squad place is now further away than ever. And of course, if they weren’t funded by a billionaire, then the lower fees they’ll receive as sellers in a hurry could be a real problem too.
Out of Manchester City’s 37 players, they have 4 goalkeepers, 13 defenders, 14 midfielders and 7 strikers – clearly more than any club needs, but where money is no object, the numbers were never a problem. Until now. Players such as Fulop, Neilsen, Garrido, Onuoha, De Jong, Michael Johnson, Stephen Ireland, Roque Santa Cruz, Bellamy and others will be watching the sports headlines with added interest to learn if their employer will be spending large amounts of money to upgrade what was previously their spot on the list. Most recently, Aleksandar Kolarov arrived for £14.1m from Lazio, but he’s not the only new arrival as he joins their £24m capture from Valencia, David Silva, £28m Barca reserve Yaya Toure and a further £10m for Jerome Boateng in the new arrivals lounge. And talk of yet more new players, step forward Aston Villa’s James Milner, Inter Milan’s Mario Balotelli, and if the press is to be believed (lol), more to come. These sure are hard times… unless you’re City.
I suppose time will tell for Mancini and his Manchester Galacticos. In the meantime, there’ll be plenty of clubs waiting for the chance to sign their spare players for reduced fees, so it’s not all bad if you’re one of the unlucky dozen.
Written by Conscience • © 2010 Conscience and AwayGoalsRule
