Manchester City* - 130 charges (and counting...)

Palmer made a few apperences last season in the Champions League group stages and League Cup.

Don’t personally remember seeing much of him, but the media the day after tended to be fairly praising of his performances from memory

I was mostly disappointed to learn that Cole Palmer is not the son of Carlton Palmer.

4 Likes

He’s the son of Carlton Cole.

2 Likes

Just saw this.

It’s not like their depth is massive at the moment, they might still sign another player (in addition to Cucurella, Phillips and Haaland) if there’s an extra departure.

Let’s say that at the moment it looks like this:

Ederson
Walker Dias Laporte Cancelo
DeBruyne Rodri Silva
Mahrez Haaland Grealish/Foden

Steffen
XXYY Stones Ake Cucurella
Palmer Phillips Gundogan
XXYY Alvarez Foden/Grealish

Of course, they probably won’t buy another full back but just use the 3 of Walker, Cancelo and Cucurella, have a kid being the 4th full back or one of their CB’s.

Question remains if Alvarez will be there next season or they loan him out.

1 Like

They’ve been pretty unambiguous in their expectations he will be with them this coming year.

Gundagon looking likely to leave, as does Silva if he gets his wish. Mahrez going into his final year.

I don’t think all of them (Gundogan, Silva, Sterling and Jesus) will leave this summer, would be too much.

They still have Zinchenko.

Yeah, but I think he might leave. If not, then they have 4 full backs.

1 Like

They want the left back lad with the curly hair from brighton.

It would be wonderful if a player they tried to sign gave them the “over my dead body” response citing their cheating as the reason against it. But that’s a Dreamworld idea of mine.

2 Likes

Yeah I think he’s a fantastic player. If he was at Liverpool he’d have the same kind of role - in terms of minutes - as Harvey Elliott or Curtis Jones at the moment. I’ll believe it when I see it with Man City though. Alvarez coming in will eat into his minutes.

Pep, a manager who once said “Nowadays there can be more focus on big-name signings rather than promoting youth and that makes me sad” certainly seems to have absolute no interest in using some of the extraordinary youth talent available to him. Likes of Harwood-Bellis, Palmer, Delap and McAtee would at least be squad depth options - possibly starters - at lot of other Premier League clubs (including us - for Palmer at least).

3 Likes

I don’t understand the Phillips transfer - apart from their need to add English players to the squad - he’s bang average.

Put it this way - his closest statistical matches are Harrison Reed, Luka Milivojevic, Wilfried Ndidi and James McArthur.

Can only hope he makes a fair few starts. A truly exceptional downgrade from the likes of Ikay Gundogan (if indeed they let him leave).

5 Likes

It’s interesting that given the size of their squad they have been forced to give load of spots on the bench to various kids this past season and despite how highly rated they are they are almost never used. I know there was criticism of how slowly he inegrated Foden and he’s now one of their more important players, so maybe there is a method, but if I had to put money on whether they’ll really let Palmer fill the gap left by Sterling and Jesus then I’d put my money on some other outcome.

4 Likes

But you know that can probably be arranged for the quotation part. :fearful:

You’ve answered the question yourself. They want to comply with the regulations while being able to use the player now and again, rather than having to put someone on the bench they will never use.

I’d bet he will see similar game playing time to Fabian Delph (between 2015-19) over the next 4 years.

With 5 subs now allowed, it becomes more important than ever now to Pep that he be not left with having to throw on a youngster. K Phillips can do that role.

The youngster can come on in injury time when they are 5 goals up to learn how to tie his own shoe laces.

Phillips will be the new Ake.

1 Like

But you don’t need to have a homegrown player at all, you just can’t have more than 17 foreign players.

2 Likes

He’s a good player tbf. Leeds fans love him. Could be a star in another team but will waste the best years of his career sitting on the City bench counting his money

2 Likes