Manchester City would normally know their recruitment plans for next season but they haven't yet been able to confirm them to help transfer plans
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Hugo Viana watches Manchester City train with Txiki Begiristain
Txiki Begiristain and Hugo Viana
When Hugo Viana accepted the position of sporting director at Manchester City, he can't have envisaged the season would have unfolded as it has. Even when he saw his employers at the time Sporting romp to a 4-1 Champions League win against the Blues in November, there wasn't anything that could be taken from that game that would have suggested the results over the next four months.
After negotiating a quicker start date at the Etihad, the official arrival of Viana a day after the derby coincided with some of the best results of City's season. Five wins in a row put the team in pole position to achieve a top-five finish and also booked their place in the FA Cup final.
The arrival of Viana was also seen as s sign that things were starting to move ahead of the summer transfer window. Kevin De Bruyne was told that he could leave when his contract expires at the end of the season and efforts have been stepped up for Florian Wirtz from Leverkusen and Morgan Gibbs-White from Nottingham Forest.
Except, as happened at Southampton on the weekend, City are still stuck. With just two games to go in the Premier League, the Blues have not been able to confirm a Champions League place.
In previous years under Guardiola they have finished 28, 22, 24, 20, 19, 28, 30 and 3 points ahead of the Champions League cut-off. You have to go back to the Catalan's first year in charge for the last time their fate wasn't secure long before the final day, and even that was more room than the two points currently separating them from Aston Villa in sixth.
The fact that 2017 was one of the best transfer windows City or any club have had in the modern era shows that it doesn't have to affect the quality of the business, yet it has to impact on the pace of it. A difficult decision between City and Bayern for Wirtz, for example, would become a no-brainer in the favour of the Bundesliga champions if the Blues were not playing in Europe's top competition.
Deals at the top have a trickle-down effect, meaning all players and their representatives cannot be fully certain of the team's plans for next season because nothing can be finalised until the club know whether or not they will have Champions League football and the extra money that comes with that.
It all adds to an unusual feeling at the Etihad where everyone knows a little less than they normally would do at this stage of the season because City cannot operate with the usual confidence that they would with Champions League football secured.
As starts go, Viana has not walked into a straightforward summer as he looks to make an instant impact following on from Txiki Begiristain.
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