Cole Palmer celebrates after scoring for Chelsea against Tottenham Hotspur
Man City sold Cole Palmer to Chelsea in 2023
Manchester City's struggles continued at they fell to defeat at the hands of Italian side Juventus in the Champions League - and Manchester Evening News readers in our comments section are wondering if the club have not been ambitious enough in the transfer market after their period of dominance.
City's run now looks dire, with just one win in ten games. Juventus put two past goalkeeper Ederson in a match where Pep Guardiola's side had the lion's share of possession, but failed to offer much threat.
The result leaves City with little hope of automatically qualifying for the round of 16 in the new-look Champions League table, and will likely instead face an additional play-off round - another fixture they could do without. Guardiola has denied that City's poor run is affecting the dressing room mentality, and insists that getting the basics right again will lift confidence.
Readers are now looking ahead to January and beyond to find solutions and rescue the season. Commenter Trublu writes: “The defence and midfield is too feeble and goals are going to be conceded. Going to take Rodri plus 6 new quality players to fix this, or else we will be in wilderness for years. The sale of Palmer looks a catastrophic event, plus others who were wrongly moved on.”
Reader Jono76 thinks that Pep's preferred small squad size has now become a liability: “Pep needs to find another way of playing. We can't keep playing tippy tappy football all around and across the box, and creating zilch. Teams are cutting through us at will. It really is embarrassing how their doing it with such regularity. Those of us old enough have seen this calamity before on many occasions. Playing with such a small squad as caught up with us all of a sudden. Pep, Txiki and the owners, have taken their eye of the ball since the treble season.”
Kolarov 13 agrees: “As soon as they sold Alvarez they had to get another striker in. You need more than 1 striker in Premier and Champions leagues.”
Jajo says: “We have not been this bad since Alan Ball was the manager. Definitely need at least 2 new signings in January, a DM, and a number 8. Let's get behind the lads, because we've got that lot on Sunday, who are worse than we are.”
De Bruyne Blue wonders if there aren't any more solutions within the club: “Now City are adrift in the PL and looking ever increasingly likely to be dumped out of the CL. We’ve played basically the same XI the last six weeks and haven’t improved one bit. The status quo simply isn’t good enough. Perhaps we could mix in some academy players going forward?”
Number 13 writes: “We need some new blood and if we carry on like this we won't attract the quality we need. Players were queuing up to sign, now I'm not so sure. Come on Pep, it takes a big man to admit you're wrong and you are respected enough to do it and make the change in approach. I really don't want to go back to 'same old City'.”
Have your say! Is Manchester City in need of a proper rebuild to get back to winning ways? Comment below, and join in on the conversation.