Damocles

Why not just the once? The argument really is would you rather be good now, or good in the past. I'd take being good now, in the years that I'm going to watch them and able to savour it all, than having being good in a time period that I may only read about in books. Oh, and this isn't a City argument, more of a general argument about whether you'd prefer a fantastic history and be crap now or a crap history and be fantastic in the present.

Really? I thought it was pretty much an open and shut case. "We've just won the league!!" "So what? We were great twenty years ago" "Yeah, but you're crap now" "But twenty years ago...."

I used to live in Wigan near the hospital. You have my deepest condolences and commiserations.

EDIT Double Post :evil:

Last season we played in England, errr....some places called 英国 and 英國, L'Angleterre, oh we had a couple games in that Αγγλία place, which we went to after we played the earlier round in Англия, finally getting knocked out of the competition when we were in Inglaterra. As you can see, we've really had lots of travelling over the last year or so, and to afford ANOTHER trip to the US was a step too far.

Where in that article do Manchester City say that? Please provide the quote. In regards to our fans, I'm pretty happy at the levels of noise made by our 47,000 every week. I've done over 40 of the 92, and whilst we are not the loudest sets of fans (Stoke), we are above average. As I said, almost none of the proper fans went out to the US because of the expense. The guys who were there were the guys on holiday with their families which isn't exactly a recipe for success. I personally didn't go, because I overspent for the World Cup and know that we have a Europa League group coming up that I need to save for. I'm not spending £3000 to watch Alex Nimley and Greg Cunningham run around, I can do that at Hyde for nothing. We always get ridiculous bloody teams in East Europe that you have to pay £1000 to a local donkey man to take you over the mountains to get to. It was only a few years back that we were drawn in the Faroe Islands and some of us had to get on a fishing trawler to get over there. I, and most other fans, simply can't afford to get over there and go to Europe this season. It's a lot of bloody money, in the same month that we renewed our £400 season tickets. So yeah, whilst I cannot speak for the Spurs or Sporting fans, that's pretty much the problem with the City lot; it wasn't really made up of our regular matchgoers. If Spurs and Sporting fans can afford their season tickets, a £3000 trip to the US, then the cost to travel around Europe all season then more power to them (the jammy bastards).

Are you actually complaining about the volume of our fans in a country that we've never visited before, in a pre-season friendly? Did you expect the place to be rocking? Do you think any of the hardcore following is going to spend the several thousand pounds to go over there to watch us play a NY team, when we've just paid for season tickets, and have a full calender of European trips on the horizon when none of the new or World Cup players were there and the game was on ESPN? I apologise if you've had a bad experience with the loudness of the fans of City's reserves who were 3000 miles away from home, please feel free to come to Eastlands next year where you'll find a much better atmosphere.

Bluemoon is great, it's like internet crack. Threads are usually started because a paper has linked us with somebody, so we discuss it. Anyway, the person who broke the news is called Freestyler. He's a nice guy, but his info is touch and go at times. Much much to the point though, one of our proven ITKs in Pollerz mentioned that a bid went in for £24m on Friday.

Bwhahahaha.

Yeah, because given the chance of winning every league title from 1900-1970 or winning the league title for the next 5 years, every single fan in the world would choose the first one :winkold: The "history" argument is beneath Villa fans, leave it to the dippers.

I should just really laugh at this stuff now, but I somehow still find myself needing to correct their bullshit. Presuming we sign Milner and Balotelli: 25 Man Squad (13 HG): Shay Given / Joe Hart / Stuart Taylor / Jerome Boateng / Joleon Lescott / Wayne Bridge / Micah Richards / Nedum Onohua / Vincent Kompany / Aleksander Kolarov / Kolo Toure / Pablo Zabaleta / Adam Johnson / David Silva / Gareth Barry / Patrick Vieira / Yaya Toure / Nigel de Jong / Stephen Ireland / Michael Johnson / James Milner* / Shaun Wright-Phillips / Emmanuel Adebayor / Craig Bellamy / Carlos Tevez Supplementary Under 21s: Dedryk Boyata / Greg Cunningham / Keiran Trippier / Jeremy Helan / Abdi Ibrahim / Vladimir Weiss / John Guidetti / Alex Tchuimeni-Nimely / Mario Balotelli* Players Not In The Squad To Sell/Exchange/Loan: David Gonzales / Javan Vidal / Javier Garrido / Salem Logan / Kelvin Etuhu / Felipe Caicedo / Jô / Robinho / Roque Santa Cruz It's hardly clearing out the ranks is it? If Onohua goes as is expected, you can stick a striker in there instead. Of that list anyway, Johnson is out until December so doesn't need to be registered (but he's in the 25 anyway), Kelvin Etuhu is getting banged up and isn't particularly good anyway, Robinho is fully expected to leave as is RSC, Vidal and Logan will be loaned out again. In fact, the only person there I'm bothered about losing is Garrido and that's more because he's a nice guy rather than he's a good player.

Yaya has never mentioned money in any interview that I have seen or heard. Neil Ashton of the NOTW paper printed an article claiming that Yaya Toure's wages could reach £220k if certain bonus conditions were met, and he was promptedly sued by all involved as he literally made it up. Yaya said after he moved here that he enjoyed his time at Barca and would like to play in the Nou Camp again someday. He showed respect towards one of the biggest clubs in the world and one that City have very close ties with, I have no problem with this at all and neither should any rational person. Next time I see Mancini I'll tell him to put Khaldoon and the Sheikh upfront. Just as you played Doug Ellis up front in the European Cup final.

It was making a point about the similarities between those cases and the accusations being levelled at us; an explanation is usually more than helpful in those cases. Besides, how intimately familiar are you on the subject of 19th century Manchester football history? How exactly was I to know that a Villa fan would know the history of John Davis and Billy Meredith. Most United fans don't know the history of John David and Billy Meredith. A fine attitude to debate with. "I know what I know and nobody can convince me otherwise". Regarding Chelsea and Blackburn; the sums of money are different though the basis of operation is the same. I'd be interested to see the difference between City and Blackburn's spending with a inflation adjusted tag. What was the British transfer record when Blackburn were throwing around the cash, and how much did they spend? If the history lessons aren't needed, then I need you to explain what "waiting our whole history to achieve" means, as you've lost me. Yes. You did: "By all means enjoy the moment and the glory you are going to buy heaven knows your club has waited just about its entire history for it to happen" I think you're right about the defensive, you were talking about the future and I read it as you talking about the now. I misjudged the tone and misread the post, apologies. Again though, it's just daftness the accusations over the Lescott saga. We put a bid in for him, it get's rejected, Hughes says something along the lines of "He's a good player, I'd like him" and suddenly we're the worst thing that ever happened to football? How is this different from Harry's catchphrase? Besides, if Everton didn't want to sell him, he would still be an Everton player. Watch what Barcelona would have done if we offered £100m for Messi. They'd say no. All Everton had to do was say no until we stop bidding and moved on to the next target. Instead, their clearing in the woods of a manager decided to make the whole thing this big public display. Do you know what Moyes' main complaint over City was? That "City showed him no respect, because Hughes didn't ring him and ask if he was available for transfer". Why exactly he feels like he needs to be rang, I'm not sure. Our Chairman will deal with their Chairman to thrash out a deal, we didn't need Moyes permission to bid for him. Did anybody ask Stuart Pearce if he'd mind if we sold SWP to Chelsea? Of course not, football just doesn't work that way. Specifically, Neil Ashton in the NOTW and in particularly Brian Woolnough at the Star stated exactly that. Then there's the Talkshite lot, but I rarely pay much attention to them. http://www.dailystar.co.uk/posts/view/143254/Man-City-spending-spree-kicks-England-in-the-teeth "For one big reason why England fail so consistently at the World Cup and European Championship, look no further than Eastlands." He has a bit of a point really. Oh, apart from Joe Hart, Nedum Onohua, Micah Richards, Joleen Lescott, Wayne Bridge, Adam Johnson, Gareth Barry, Michael Johnson and Shaun Wirght Phillips. Then there's the England U-20's side, who recently fielded a team with 7 City players playing in it. Then there's the fact that in a little under 10 years, we've brought through 30 players from our youth systems and last year gave debuts to Boyata, Cunningham, Nimley, Trippier, Ibrahim and Mee. Oh and that we keep buying young English players like Henshall from Swindon. Ahem. Anyway, we're currently the hot topic for journalists as every good forum knows, the press is always against your team. Because we are getting more press, we are receiving more insults and downright fabrications, and it gets annoying after a while. So by that school of thought, you believe that everything that Brum fans say about Villa is actually correct, as they have the perception of you as away fans?

Any particular reason?

The history 'lesson' wasn't directed at you, it was making a point about the cylical nature of football and the fact that all of these things have been said and done before. City are no different from a string of clubs who have done the same thing. Besides, ridiculous views deserved to be laughed at. "The death of football"? Yep, I'm sure the 92 will just pack it in now that City have a bit of money. Also, I didn't expect anything but the responses I get. I'm not exactly sure how you are forecasting my expectations either. You realise that we've already won the league, FA cup, league cup, and Cup Winnners Cup? You also realise that outside the last thirty years, we've been a top club since about 1898? How old are you? I'm sure it's City who buy the glory. All of Villa's players play for free and came through their youth system. John Carew had pictures of Dalian Atkinson on his wall as a kid, one day just wishing that he could emulate his hero. £60,000 a week is perfectly fair, upstanding and honourable. £120,000 a week is classless, immoral and should be banned dammit! This is the thing though, the fans have hardly changed a bit. There's a small (and young) element of our fans who are the shouters, but the main core group, over 90% of them, haven't changed at all. As I have said before, I'm an admin over on the Bluemoon forum, I spend all day in the company of internet City fans, I go to the pub and drink with City fans, then go to the game and talk to more City fans. In addition to this, I have written for fanzines, blogs, etc and received feedback or letters. I wouldn't presume to tell you the attitude of Villa fans, and I'd hope you would extend me the same privilege about City fans. City fans will become the most hated in the country simply because of journalistic platitudes that people throw out about our club. Examples, Yaya on £220k a week (he isn't), Tevez transfer fee £57m (it wasn't), City linked with X player for Y amount (which we really can't help), City about to throw out all youth players (wrong), etc. We buy foreign, we ruin the game by killing off chances for young English players; we've actually been blamed by some parts of the media for England having a shit World Cup. We buy English, we ruin the game because we are paying overinflated prices for players such as Lescott. I don't think people are jealous, some will be and that will form a resentment towards us, but I don't think most are. The resentment is down to speed. The fact is, if City were to buy one player a season for £30m, nobody would blink an eye about us and the way that we are doing things. People's problem is that we are buying all at once. I have no idea why this is a problem to any other fan in the world, I suppose you could make the inflated transfer price argument, but there's evidence to the contrary, such as Villa's move to Barcelona and Benayoun's move to Chelsea. Seriously, I argue that City aren't bad for football, because I honestly don't see it. I didn't see the logic in the argument that Chelsea were bad for football either. Maybe it's down to people's view of football. I recognise that football is and always has been a business. As shown in the post above, there has never been a time in the whole history of the game where it wasn't dominated by money. For the past 20 years the footballer has been out of reach to the average man, wage wise. I don't particularly see this as a bad thing either. Football clubs are private companies, let them spend their money on whatever they like. I don't understand the idea of money and corporatism ruins the game. We have better facilities, we have safer stadiums where you can take your family, we have higher profile players who do much more for charity and pay much more tax into the UK coffers. The idea of players playing for loyalty and not money NEVER existed. Ever. It's a myth, a complete fabrication. Even Paul Dickov at City played for the money, even if it was the Second Division money. Tell the Villa squad that they won't get paid for a year and see how many of them stay. Or, tell them that they are all getting their expenses paid, and a small wage of £10,000 a week. Think about that; ten thousand pound every single week. They'd baulk at it and walk away tomorrow. So would United players, City players, Burnley players, Hull players, etc. Players do establish a rapport with the fans and start to love the club eventually, like Goater at City or McGrath at Villa. They become legends who do do things for the fanbase because of love not money, but to pretend that they played for anything else to start off with is foolish. As I say, our fans will definitely become (more) hated than they already are, and it has very little to do with us and more to do with people's perception of us. I earlier posted a "Tears of Joy" video, I could also post a lot more of that type of activity that the club has done, or the fanbase has done. Can anyone really give me a list of objections about City that are based in fact and not crap that you've read in the paper? Mancini's won trophies everywhere he has ever been, is only young, and is personal friends with the both the Sheikh and our Chairman. He'll stay.

The difference is that Spurs already have a more gelled-together and Prem-adjusted squad than City. So if Spurs were to bring in additional new players from outside the Prem, they would be joining a more solid base compared to City, who, if they bring in more players from outside the Prem, are adding them to a squad that already contains a fair few first XI players who are either new to the Prem and/or haven't had as much time to gel with their team mates as their equivalent at Spurs. For example, Silva (if he plays wide attacking left) compared to Bale, or Y.Toure compared to Huddlestone, or Kolarov compared to Ekotto, or Boateng compared to Corluka. In each case these Spurs players are already Prem-adjusted and gelled within the team. Players City brought in with no Prem experience before this season: De Jong Kompany Robinho Players done this season: Silva Yaya Boateng I make that 6 players without Premiership experience in the last 4 years. Players brought in with Prem experience: Given Taylor Lescott Toure Bridge Johnson Barry Viera SWP Adebayor Bellamy Tevez Roque Santa Cruz Not exactly damning, this evidence for "Prem adjusting" is it? Perhaps, just perhaps, you finished above us last season because we changed manager halfway through it as the previous one has literally lost us 10 points in ridiculous tactical decisions?

Everton wanted £30m+ for Lescott. Besides, the £24m fee is based upon appearances, bonuses, etc, etc. I'd be surprised if we had already paid them £15m So, Milner. Expect a £24m bid to be lodged soon. Well, last Friday, if rumours are to be believed. Could be all over by next week

I can never take people seriously who say this (nothing personal). It shows a complete and utter lack of knowledge about the history of the game in all of its forms. Want to know who ruined football? Preston, Billy Meredith (ex-City but at United at the time), and Middlesborough. Man United and Liverpool didn't help (neither did Jimmy Hill), but we'll forget them for a bit. Preston (and many other clubs) used to engage in a trade known as shamatuerism. This is at a time where all footballers were gentlemen amateurs and the FA had declared paying players illegal and against the spirit of the game. Local teams for local gents, so to speak. Unfortunately, the Northern clubs at the time were trying to compete with the dominance of the Oxbridge set and engaged in this shamatuerism. This was the practice of inviting excellent players (most of whom were Scottish) to live within the certain radius of the clubs, and find them 'jobs' at the club to pay them. They would be paid several quid a week for doing nothing and hold a pretty title to get around the ruleset. I seem to recall reading that it was Preston who got caught out doing this, though the practice was fairly widespread; so widespread in fact that the FA finally relented and declared it legal to trade players despite a lobby from a huge group of people who declared it human trafficking. Billy Meredith was a legendary winger in Manchester, as he played for both halves of the City to great success. He was actually born in Wales, started at City, was a winger with the "Welsh Wizard" nickname, was a very highly respected pro and one of the first football superstars who moved to United. He was basically Ryan Giggs of his day. Meredith was accused of match fixing whilst playing for City after he tried to bribe a Villa player £10 to lose the match. Subsequently, the FA banned him from playing for City. After Meredith left, he spoke out of a practice that was going on at City which was, again, widespread in football and was putting additions on to the £4 weekly wage of players. It was actually the first performance related bonus of it's time. Anyway, Meredith moved over to United, and as City had just been nailed to the wall, had their team disbanded, their whole board banned and being relegated, everybody soon stopped with the performance bonuses. However, Meredith was always a standout performer so took his bonus for granted. He had gone from earning around £5 a week, to earning £4 (the max wage at the time). Due to this, he and a group of UNited players banded together, called themselves "The Outcasts" and went on strike. This was actually an early precursor to the PFA, and it's single issue was the removal of the £4 a week wage cap. Just a quick thing actually, when the FA banned players from being able to join this Union, every Villa player immediately resigned and wrote a public letter stating that they wouldn't rejoin until given permission by the FA to do so. The Outcasts were eventually victorious in changing the wage structure and the FA allowed the Union to be a part of the game. This was mainly down to the influence of both Meredith as it's Chair and John Davis who was United's 'sugar daddy' at the time. John Davis ran a few breweries in Manchester and had originally watched the precursor to United (Newton Heath) fall flat into bankruptcy, despite a hefty donation at the time from Man City (who pre '58 were the bigger club). Out of Newton Heath came United, and Davis set about buying all of the top players in Britain before they were even admitted to the Football League. A good comparison, would be Burton Albion paying £150m for Wayne Rooney now. Anyway, thanks to Davies and Meredith, the concept of the power being in the hands of the FA dissolved in front of them. Due to this incident, the power was now in the hands of the Chairmen and players of the clubs. The Middlesborough link is a fairly short aside. Despite facing relegation and being nowhere near the top clubs in England, Boro went out and became the first club to pay £1000 for a player in Alf Commons. Funnily enough, people used to complain that Boro had no prestige and the transfer shouldn't have been allowed as it was ruining football. This was in 1905, how much we have evolved over the past century. So, if you believe that player power and wages have ruined the game, blame Meredith, if you believe that Sugar Daddies have ruined the game, blame Davis/United, if you believe that transfer fees have ruined the game, blame Preston or Middlesborough. Personally, I don't believe that football is ruined or dead at all, and it's a bit funny that you see old articles from the 20's about the exact same subject, with the same melodramatic headlines. With the money that has come into City, absolutely nothing has changed apart from the fact that an extra club is in or around the battle for the CL spots. Football runs in cycles, as Villa fans should know all too well, and eventually every empire crumbles. The natural order of this was to be beaten by a better team, though the payments and gates from the CL places has stopped this and allowed some of them to consolidate a powerbase. It seems that though other teams used to crumble empires, they will now do it themselves with debt. There's also the issue of FIFA or UEFA ruining football through their eventual plans for the homegrown rule. This makes it possible that English players are hugely more expensive than their foreign counterparts and only the richest clubs can afford to take that hit. Therefore, outside the big four you can either spend money to buy English to meet their rules, or you can buy foreign, save yourself some money and have to sell your best players when it comes to registering your squad. As I say, all of these melodramatic "death of football/ruining football" talk is a little bit shortsighted, and actually quite funny.

So where will your £150k per week captain be playing? Do you honestly believe that Kolo Toure is on £150k a week? Anyway, most City fans don't rate Toure which is why I said it is expected, not that it's what we will play. Personally, he's my second favourite player at the club (behind Adam Johnson), and I rate him very highly. He'll be there or thereabouts. The stated aim is that we have two quality players for every position, so that would mean 4 CBs of which we have Toure, Kompany, Lescott and Onuhua. Bridge/Kolarov at LB, Richards/Boateng at RB with Zabaleta filling in where he is needed. Underrated is Zab, he can play anywhere in defence or midfield and does his job efficiently. Bit of a dirty bastard but some games you need a strong tackler in there with the Toure's of this world.

This is the City that I wish the rest of the world could see. It's the same one that us fans see regularly, with things such as the Hyde fundraising, the Manchester redevelopment projects and the community work. http://www.mcfc.co.uk/Video/Features/US-Tour-Spanish-Harlem

I'd be shocked if that wasn't already the case. With the rumours flying around, I'd be surprised if Milner's agent hadn't already told City what terms they expect, etc. Especially as we continue to be linked with other midfielders.

We were crap against Sporting Don't think it particularly matters as Sporting had to contend with the mighty strikeforce of Bellamy and Jo, which was later replaced by Guidetti and Nimley. We had a good few players who are at least in contention for the first team though, and our back triangle of Hart, Lescott and Kompany is expected to be our first choice next season. Either way, it was a horrific game to watch, against opposition who were fitter, stronger and played far better football. I can barely remember us stringing two passes together. The players and management are pretty much blaming the lack of fitness and sweltering heat. The only friendly which I'm particularly bothered about so far is Dortmund in a few weeks time, as our team should be pretty much solid by then, in a normal climate, with all of the World Cup players/new signings back. Next game is on Sunday night. Not a bad footy night Sunday; it's Spurs first, us after them, then United after them all in a line.

To be fair, it's actually called the "Elite Development Squad", not the Elite Squad. This is for players who are under the age of 21 and we feel have a good future in front of them. These players have taken the place of the reserves in the Reserve league to give them some football, and will also be part of exchange programs with clubs such as Sporting around the world. Just like a few other clubs, we have dissolved our reserve team as we believe that those players who are above 21 should be playing football somewhere and we'll loan them out, just like we did with Caciedo, Weiss, McDermott, etc. It's still a shit name though, Elite Development Squad, and City seemed to have realised this and have started referring to them as the Elite U-21s. I imagine in time this will just become the U-21s. The Hyde thing is quite simple. They were about to be folded, as in the whole "ground knocked down, club doesn't exist any more" type of folded. We actually gave them permission to do some fundraising at a few games last season, by carrying donation buckets around our ground, I'm pretty sure they were there when we played Villa actually. Anyway, we did this to sustain them for the rest of the season, and afterwards we setup a financial deal for them. Just to be clear, our reserves already have a 15,000 seater stadium across the road from the CoM called the Regional Athletics Stadium. It doesn't benefit us at all to move to Hyde, we're playing in a worse place than we were before, with worse facilities. The reason we did, was because we wanted to save the local club. As part of this arrangement and to promote the fact that Hyde are now part of the City ecosystem so to speak, we paid for their ground and training facilities to be completely redeveloped.

I seem to think that if Milner was going to tell us to get stuffed, he would have done it by now

This has just taken an interesting turn. We're after Schweinsteiger, and the deal is very close. I would imagine that we would walk from Milner, if we get him instead. I don't understand though, as I've been told personally that we're really keen on him. Perhaps some misdirection going on somewhere, or perhaps we couldn't agree the fee and moved on. Hell, we might actually grab him anyway which would indicate that we're about to sell Barry, or put him on the wing and sell SWP.