Manchester City 2020/21 – retrospective recruitment analysis

Manchester City are one of the richest clubs in the world. The club owner Sheikh Mansour has been committed to the projects since 2014, when the City Football Group (CFG) was founded as a holding company to administrate clubs under the ownership of Abu Dhabi United Group (ADUG). As the most symbolic Flagship club, Manchester City have achieved remarkable results in the past decade. Recruitment was a huge part of all these as football is about players, and finding good players need strategies.

Recently, City won the appeal of the UEFA ban from the Court of Arbitration of Sport (CAS). This means Pep Guardiola’s men already guaranteed a spot in the UEFA Champions League 2020/21, which was an attractive factor for players to consider. In addition, the unsatisfactory results in the Premier League this season have reflected the fact that the team need a rebuild.

In this retrospective recruitment analysis, we are investigating the recruitment history of City in the past five years, including the trends, patterns, and targeted leagues.

Overview

In the past five seasons, City have added 32 players to the squad. This number was calculated after gathering the data and statistics from Transfermarkt, which are the basis of this analysis. Only players that joined the first team are counted to eliminate the buying for the academy or other CFG teams. For example, Douglas Luiz and Jack Harrison were signed in 2017 with a price of €12m and €4m, but they are excluded as they were not in the first-team squad for different reasons.

The below image summarised all players that were added to the first-team squad in the past five years. Mainly there were four ways to recruit – permanent transfer and promoting from the second team were the most common transactions, accounting for 93.75% of players recruitment. Another two methods were applicable to two players – Eliaquim Mangala, who returned from Valencia as a backup centre-back and Scott Carson, the third goalkeeper and a loan player from Derby County.

Summarising the transfer fee and the age at arrival, we can know more about the targeted age groups of players and an estimated budget of the team. Although City are rich, investing a huge amount on one individual was not likely to happen. None of the City signings have made it into the top 20 recorded transfer fees. Spending €80m on a goalkeeper or over €100m on a field player was not the practice of the club. Currently, the most expensive signing is Kevin De Bruyne from Wolfsburg, City paid €76m for the Belgian international and this has proved to be a good deal.

However, spending around €50m to €70m to strengthen the squad is an acceptable range for City. Many key players in the current squad such as Aymeric Laporte, Raheem Sterling, and Riyad Mahrez were purchased with a price in this range. Note that only Mahrez and Kyle Walker in this range has exceeded 25 years old when joining the team. City were carefully building a young squad and the players with this price tag are expected to stay for a long time.

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