After a stop & start season due to off-field worldwide issues, Manchester City finished a distant second to newly crowned Premier League Champions Liverpool this season. Finishing on a “just” 81 points, this fell 18 points short of Liverpool despite the light blues outscoring Liverpool and finishing on a superior goal difference.
Considering the above, it should come as little surprise to many that reports are circulating that Manchester City owners are allocating Pep Guardiola a transfer chest of £300m this summer window in an attempt to bridge the large gap between themselves and the Merseysiders.
The Sky Blues have already made a key addition to their squad, splashing £20.8m on winger Ferran Torres from Valencia, who at the age of just 20 is considered a fantastic signing. However, it’s unlikely that City will stop there, with key players and senior employees apparently having been told to expect significant investment; likely been said to settle nerves and try and quash any thoughts from players who may have been considering their futures after City offered such a weak response finishing second by a country mile.
So, who may Manchester City be looking to sign before the new season gets underway next month on the 12th of September? Two key additions are seen to be both Nathan Ake from Bournemouth who looks set to sign for the Sky Blues for a fee of around £41,000,000 after the Dutchman agreed personal terms last week.
In addition to Ake, as Guardiola looks to strengthen defensively seems likely to be Napoli superstar performer; Kalidou Koulibaly for a significant fee rumoured to be around £81 million. This fee would smash City’s previous transfer record and surely show their intent for next season.
Should all three of these signings materialise, this would only represent around half of the £300m budget being touted in the media. Should this be the case, we can expect to see a few more names leaked to the media in the coming days and weeks. Whether these, at present unknown moves, are enough to bridge the gap between the Merseysiders and the Sky Blues… remains to be seen, and as such, many punters having a flutter on City for the title this coming season will likely be relying on free betting uk as opposed to spending any of their own money backing the Sky Blues.
