Roberto Mancini and the daunting task he faces at Manchester City
With big money come big aspirations and big pressures and if Mancini suffers the same fare as his predecessor Hughes did, he surely is not going down without a fight.
It is just three weeks to the start of the Premier League and Mancini already looks the most vulnerable manager in the ‘top six’.
The sheer weight of the Arab owner’s expectations coupled with the manner of Hughes dismissal puts City and Hughes in a very precarious situation.
The expectations are big and so is the pressure on the Italian but he is a brave heart and initial signs indicate that the Italian is going to give his rivals a scare of their lives.
His style is reminiscent to that of Jose Mourinho’s at Chelsea, like the Portuguese the Italian is determined to be his own man.
His public poaching of Fernando Torres, despite a summer spending that already stands in excess of 75 million, and his public declaration that his rivals are scared of City was a clear statement of intent from the Italian manager, but all his actions and words have only made him a hostage to the future.
Nevertheless that is what the City fans demand from their manager.
They loved the infamous ‘Welcome to Manchester’ poster that infuriated Alex Ferguson and are sick of being the perennial under-achievers, centre of one Manchester joke after another. After all, their trophy drought is 34 years long.
After all these years of turmoil and living under the shadow of their illustrious neighbours the fans believe that their time is around the corner; Mancini is threatening the established order.
For Mancini this is not going to be easy, he has to deliver, start like a train and keep going on.
His season has not started on the best of notes after back to back defeats in the United States at the hands of Sporting Lisbon and New York Red bulls have not filled the hearts of the fans with confidence. Although he started those games not with his preferred choice of players but the implementation of the home grown rule by FA is hardly morale boosting for Mancini. Nonetheless, Mancini remains buoyant, chivalrous and confident.
Openly confessing about his admiration of Torres is nothing less than being mischievous. He knows very well that he has to keep trying to keep his not-so-forgiving owners happy, he knows Liverpool is a club in financial limbo and City are a team that is seeking to make their mark on history by rewriting it, not emulating it.
There have been rumours that there is an unofficial deal between Chelsea and City that they will not go for the same players in the market, therefore preventing the inflation in prices and being drawn into a bidding war.
The rumours resulted from a lunch time meeting between Mancini and Ancelotti but both the parties deny the claims.
Torres has long been on Chelsea’s radar and the London club is highly unlikely to pay a price of more than 50 million pounds but City will more than happily go over the 50 million mark to make Torres the most expensive player in the Premier League.
However, all is not rosy for Mancini as he still has to decide on who will be his 25 preferred players for the next season, a list that has to include 8 Englishmen.
Even City’s fixture list has not been very kind to them as they start their campaign against their latest rivals, Tottenham Hotspurs, who snatched the 4th place from City last season to earn the right to be playing in the Champions League. The game against Spurs is followed by two against Liverpool and Chelsea before the end of September, meaning that pressure will on Mancini from the outset.
Mancini was a success at Inter, where he ended a 17 year trophy drought bringing their first Serie A title, be it on the back of Calcio Football Scandal. However at City it is a different ball game altogether. The teams that he is up against are much better than his opposition in Serie A and their trophy drought is double than the one he ended in Milan.
So far though, Mancini is an icon in Manchester, he is talking the talk, and his silk scarf is the must-have fashion accessory in certain parts of Manchester.
But the real test only starts in just over two weeks time and if he fails that; he will be out of the door, unfortunately the equation is that simple for Mancini
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