Methodical Man City already planning summer transfers as Man Utd panic with Wout Weghorst
Across the city, there will be an air of bemusement at Manchester United’s low cost move to bring Wout Weghorst back to the Premier League just a few months after the ignominy of the striker’s parent club Burnley suffering relegation.
Weghorst, 30, with a mixed record and no elite club on his CV, is a sticking plaster applied to a transfer strategy that hasn’t been fit for purpose at Old Trafford, a jarring reminder that for all the positive early signs under Erik ten Hag there is still so much work to do to return United to a position where they can effectively challenge the best.
In the week of the Manchester derby, it is also a reminder that the standards are set – on and off the field – by rivals just a few miles away.
Pep Guardiola and Txiki Begiristain would never say it in public, but Manchester City would rather do nothing at all in January than go for a stop gap option like Weghorst. Whatever issues Guardiola has spotted with a group that is five points behind Arsenal and is yet to fully find the levels of devastating consistency he knows they are capable of, they won’t try to find a solution in the January sales.
Indeed i has been told that with regards to first team players for this season City will – once again – do nothing at all of significance in the transfer market this month. Options for the future? The South American market is City’s new playground and Velez’s precocious midfielder Maximo Perrone is of interest but any move for the 19-year-old would likely see him stay in Argentina until the summer, just as Julian Alvarez remained there after a £14m transfer was agreed for the striker last year.
This is how elite clubs should do it in January.
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The strategy is a source of pride within the club, a sign that their recruitment is functioning as it should. They resisted any temptation to move for a forward 12 months ago when the need for a new source of goals very nearly ended up costing them the league title – but any critics were silenced when they won the race to sign the peerless Erling Haaland.
The same approach is being pursued this month. When Guardiola met Begiristain and chairman Khaldoon Al Mubarak in Abu Dhabi during City’s warm weather camp during the World Cup break there were “no names” put on the table for January, to quote City’s manager.
But a series of a longer-term issues were on the agenda. City’s ongoing interest in Borussia Dortmund’s Jude Bellingham is likely to have featured, along with ongoing work on a succession plan for key men like Bernardo Silva and Kyle Walker. Summer sales of Raheem Sterling and Gabriel Jesus illustrated boldness in player trading which will become their motif moving forward. The club like to think they are one step ahead of their rivals; proactive rather than reactive in the market.
In the meantime no influx of new names means opportunities for younger players: homegrown Rico Lewis’s star continues to rise while Cole Palmer’s integration continued with a place in the FA Cup team that flattened Chelsea. Both were born within ten miles of the Etihad.
The lack of intent to do business makes the month feel fairly serene and Guardiola is back where he feels most comfortable: concentrating on the football and working with a group who still have several levels to go through.
He said City were “alive” again after seeing them put four past the struggling Blues, another team that look lost and are groping for solutions in the transfer window. As opposed to the stuttering midweek win at Stamford Bridge in the league, Guardiola’s side looked like they were ominously moving through the gears at the Etihad. City remain the Premier League’s team to beat, in more ways than one.
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