Abu Dhabi and Man City - Lost in Translation

In all of the news reported regarding Abu Dhabi United Group's spectacular takeover of Manchester City Football Club on Monday, including the ridiculous ease with which they secured the services of Robinho for a record breaking GBP 32.4 million, people seemed to have forgotten a few crucial things about the beautiful game.
 
And that is namely that this does not adhere to the hard and fast rules of usual business such as real estate or even television, which the Donald Trump of Abu Dhabi is so well schooled in.
 
Al Fahim may have got his hands on one of the sleeping giants of the English top league as well as one of the most exciting young talents in football, albeit at a price of a GBP 160,000 per week. However, perhaps it is more interesting to look at what he has not got his hands on yet - a team.
 
In fact Al Fahim may just have bought the opposite. Team spirit comes from a confidence in the future. For the players presently occupying the City of Manchester Stadium there may be no tomorrow.
 
The Premier League transfer window closed at midnight on Monday 1st September (It was extended because the set date of 31 August fell on a Sunday) and will not reopen until 1 Jan 2009.
 
This means that in spite of Al Fahim's pledge to build a dream team of a “minimum” of 18 players, Mark Hughes, the current manager of Manchester City, needs to somehow motivate his current squad who presumably have now woken up to the fact that they will no longer have a job in three months time.
 
That's a disaster for the manager, Hughes, now landed with the new impossible job of English football:  building a winning team from demotivated players, in the face of a wave of heightened expectation.
 
With no confidence in the future, there can be no team spirit. With no team spirit, lose hope in Man City's journeymen getting much breathing space from the bottom of the Premiership.
 
Teams win things: It's why Greece won Euro 2004, why England's supposed talented generation did not get to Euro 2008, and why Manchester United pipped Chelsea to last year's Champions League and Premiership titles.
 
How does Hughes motivate the likes of Dunne, Hamann, Ireland, et al who must be furiously phoning their agents looking for another club to take them on at the arrival of the new dream team?
 
Presumably the fans will not care how the team perform in the next three months, looking through rose-tinted spectacles at the prospect of the likes of Ronaldo, Kaka, and any other world class star who proves himself in the next three months, coming to (Middle) Eastlands.
 
But Al Fahim has stated that he wants a top four finish this season - and as any football fan knows, the English Premier League is not a sprint, it is a marathon.
 
Hughes will care.
 
If he has any chance of staying in charge of one of the most exciting times at Manchester City, he needs results. He needs to build a platform by the January transfer window where the club are competing at the highest level to a) attract more world class payers to the club, (although astronomic weekly wages circa the $320,000 per week currently on offer might tempt more players than Robinho) and b) to put himself in a place where a top four finish is possible.
 
Hughes himself must be looking at the likes of Jose Mourinho and Avram Grant, who in spite of bringing back glory to Stamford Bridge, still found themselves surplus to requirements when the highest targets alluded them in spite of a bulging cheque book.
 
This deal still looks a good one on paper for Abu Dhabi United Group, and a good one for Manchester City. But is it a good deal for Mark Hughes and for the current Manchester City squad (bar one Robinho)? Is it a good deal for City at all this season..?
 
Football may well be a funny old game, but the tears in Manchester come this December may not be from joy...

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READERS' COMMENTS

The sleeping Giant has awoken
Posted by Mr Mahon, Manchester, United Kingdom on Friday 12 September 2008 at 17:46 UAE time


There is a team in MAN CITY but as with new challenges you just need to put a couple of cogs in the wheel and it will function beautifully.

Manchester City
Posted by James, Manchester, United Kingdom on Tuesday 9 September 2008 at 23:39 UAE time

Your comments are all if, buts, maybe, presuming, are you a United Fan????.

Manchester City are confident the players will try to prove themselves and then we may not need 18 new players cheer-up.

If there is truth in wanting Ronaldo its best to get it out in the open early so that the United fans get time to accept it should it happen United fans dont like shocks at the last minute.

Lost In Translation
Posted by william, Manchester, United kingdom on Sunday 7 September 2008 at 16:59 UAE time


May I remind the author that my club Manchester City have made great strides in the last 18 months and where fourth until Christmas last season. Since then we have recruited a great manager in Mark Hughes along with Jo, SWP, Kompany, Tel Ben Haim, Zabaleta and now Robihno. The average age of the team that beat Sunderland 3-0 away was only 23, the youngest apart from Arsenal in the Premiership. Allied to this we have a tremendous Youth system with the likes of Sturridge, Evans & Weiss sure to be pushing for the first team this season. Therefore there is no need for a complete new team just tweaking it with 2 or 3 top class players.

manchesters city = journeymen
Posted by Abu Dhabi and Man City - Lost in Translation, dublin, ireland on Wednesday 3 September 2008 at 15:05 UAE time

journeymen? zableta, richards, elano, wright philips, jo, petrov,

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