Blue Moon Rising

In many ways Man City is a great success but with their wage power and desire to have a plethora of world class players in each position they are pooling too much talent and detracting from the good of the league. Understandably, in the eyes of the City board, who cares about the league as long as they are sitting pretty at the top of it, but for the average fan there is a genuine fear. Does this plan risk creating too great a gap between the big clubs and the rest of the league? An extreme example would be La Liga or the SPL in which each year there are only 2 teams viably competing for the title. If you are a world-class player playing in Spain the likelihood is you will be playing for Madrid or Barca – a high-class player in the SPL…the Old Firm. Luckily for the Barclays Premiership there is a far greater number of long established great clubs and with managers like Hodgson at West Brom and Pulis at Stoke the lower clubs are able, on occasion, to challenge the big guns.

The problem I am trying to get at is that, quite simply, City are hogging all the talent, and it must be because of the wages. A desire for Champions League football and a desire to win silverware – these dreams can come from more clubs than just Man City, so why go to a club where you can never be guaranteed a place in the squad, let alone the starting XI?  To my mind the best example of this is in the form of Nigel de Jong. What is he doing? De jong is a top class international holding midfield player. In the City set up he competes with Barry, Hargreaves and Toure for 1 – 2 if he is lucky – positions in the starting XI. With such strong attacking minded midfielders and strikers overflowing into midfield to make room, invariably de Jong is benched and it begs the question, why is he happy with this? Why is Nasri happy to warm the bench for Silva? Why is Dzeko happy to be left on the bench for Aguero?  This situation is not only farcical but also detrimental in many ways. The amount of top-class strikers available forces other players to give way to accommodate them, often in the wide positions, at the expense of English talent like Adam Johnson, whose career can only be being stilted through its lack of first team football.

At any other Premiership club these players would be stars – immediately launched to hero status – captaining the teams, having thousands of supporters worship them as their talisman. To be part of a squad that plays in the Champions League would be an incredible experience but surely as a player the key to your career is to actually play football? The only conclusion that can seemingly be made is that the draw of money tops all other concerns. The sad thing, however, is that in writing this piece the more I think about it the more I cannot blame them. Football is a short career and as the game gets faster, with more emphasis on pace, the expiry date on players is getting earlier and earlier – excluding the bionic Giggs and Scholes of course – and with limited options for a retired footballer outside of coaching and punditry one will surely want to earn as much money as possible in the time available. The entire City team 2011-12 cannot present MOTD together in 10 years time, neither can they all become the next manager of Wrexham, there just isn’t enough opportunity for retired footballers and this, I feel, definitely plays a part in their striving for more money at the cost of playing time. Maybe I’m over thinking it? Maybe they’re just greedy, who knows? I prefer to wear my rose tinted glasses on this one.

The problem of Man City's wages is, however, not only affecting other clubs abilities to get players in the first place but also in getting them back once City are done with them. The only assumption can be that Man City have ascended the football ladder even quicker than the Big Wigs anticipated, because before they can even get players like Adebayor up and running he has already been usurped and sidelined as a bit part player. In this there can be seen some level of revenge I suppose because £175k a week is the value of Adebayor's contract and with such an obscene amount of money being offered no club is able to loan the player without significant help. Tottenham have taken up some of the slack but essentially Man City are now left to pay £100k a week for a player to go out and score goals for a major rival, it seems all a bit ridiculous to me.

I understand that financial fair play will be put in place in an attempt to block this devolution into selfishness but with the Etihad Stadium naming rights saga already making a mockery of that, who knows what can be done? One must hope that it doesn’t spread but with Russian club Anzhi now getting in on the act who knows? The hope I have is that the effect of this money upon players’ characters will awaken owners to their failings - as is already seemingly visible in Tevez’s refusal to play. My hope is that the other big clubs in England can hold onto them with money spent wisely, youth fostered effectively and successful management. The Premiership can remain as competitive as before and show that hopefully money cant buy you everything – though following a 6-1 demolition of last years champions at Old Trafford am I living in a dream world?