On their web page, a bit of perspective for a change.
Even in the midst of his FA Cup joy, Manchester City boss Roberto Mancini bridled at one question. Asked in the immediate aftermath of the weekend’s win over United, about whether City’s big spending is now starting to pay off, the Italian looked slightly annoyed, slightly mystified and wholly fed-up.
His point is a simple one whenever he is faced with such questions.
No team wins the Premier League, or the Champions League, these days, without spending plenty of dosh.
The two things go together irrevocably, in an age where the league title is as much like the FTSE index as it is a football competition – a rough approximation of wealth.
City have repeatedly been accused of “trying to buy the title”, as if there is any other way of winning it other than spending large amounts on players.
Those who ask such questions are stuck in a Seventies time warp, still believing in an age when Brian Clough emerged from the second division with a rag-tag bunch of misfits, unknowns and journeymen and swept to the championship at the first tilt.
Mancini’s irritation is justified by the figures.
City have spent around £325m since Sheikh Mansour’s takeover nearly three years ago, in a concerted and concentrated attempt to turn the club from mid-table meanderers into one of Europe’s elite.
That is what sticks in the throat of the purists and the green-eyed jealous. But the truth is that United and Chelsea – the only teams to have won the Premier League in the past six seasons – have both splurged the money.
Much is made of Alex Ferguson’s revamp of United’s youth policy in the Nineties but little is made of the fact that to kick-start the Red revolution he spent unprecedented sums.
Mark Hughes, Gary Pallister, Paul Ince, Mike Phelan, Neil Webb, Danny Wallace and Denis Irwin were all part of his spending spree, and that led directly to United’s first title for 25 years – the home-grown talents started to filter through after that.
In the process of building their current squad, United have spent around £315m since the purchase of Rio Ferdinand in 2002, while Chelsea have shelled out £376m in their quest for the title since Roman Abramovich took over.
And once City’s untold wealth became known, Abramovich’s mass spending at Chelsea was almost forgotten.
Established
The Londoners have quickly become part of the established elite, the root of their wealth and success glossed over.
Everyone “buys” the title to some extent, but some people object to the coarse “nouveaux riche” having their day in the sun.
“For one year, people have kept asking about my spending but we didn’t buy Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi,” said Mancini.
“We have bought young players, good players, but players who all need to improve because it was their first season in the Premier League.
“When fantastic players, like Eric Cantona, first come to this country they find it difficult at first. But our players who have played so-so can next year play better, and we can also improve the team.”
That has been at the nub of Mancini’s spending. He has targeted players under the age of 25, preferably English, but principally players who can grow together and win together.
The spending is not bottomless.
This summer it is likely that only one or two big names will join, even though Champions League qualification would mean that the club becomes more attractive to European stars than it has ever been.
Finishing in the top four would give Mancini greater scope and mean that City truly could compete for names like Andrea Pirlo, Sergio Aguero and Kaka.
But the bulk of the spending has been done, and City are keeping a careful eye on the financial fair play regulations which start to bite next season.
Mancini shouldn’t get all the credit. In fact, the relative success of this season so far has been built largely around signings by previous managers.
Mark Hughes brought in Carlos Tevez, Nigel de Jong and Vincent Kompany, perhaps the three most outstanding players of the campaign to date – although Mancini signing David Silva has to be close.
All of them had slow starts to their City careers.
Tevez took a couple of months to get into the groove, de Jong was underwhelming and even Kompany looked like he may be the odd man out when the Sheikh’s spending began to beef up the City midfield and central defence.
That brings the argument back to Mancini’s second point. Since last summer he has splurged on Jerome Boateng, Aleks Kolarov, Mario Balotelli, James Milner and Edin Dzeko, as well as Silva, and none of them has ripped up any trees.
But the average age of those five is a shade over 23 years old, plenty of time to mature into the top players which their CVs suggest they can be.
Having a pop at City has become the latest hobby among English football fans, but to blame them for the obscenity of Premier League spending is nonsense.
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