Martin Samuels As Recommended by the OS

[johnny crossan]

Grumbling City players are not happy at fourth-rate club


Manchester City are fourth, so what is the problem? Manchester City are fourth, that is the problem.
Technically, the club is exactly where it wants to be, in a league position that fits the plan to qualify for the Champions League this season and challenge for the title the next. City are on course.
There are plenty in the Premier League that are not. Ask the supporters of Everton, Liverpool, Fulham or Aston Villa if they feel their club is where it hoped to be. West Ham United have already tagged one fixture 'Save Our Season' and it is not even Christmas.
Yet while every club has its tensions, nowhere does resentment and anger seem to be brimming beneath the surface quite like Manchester City. The usual mitigations are advanced: players are at each others' throats simply because they care, but that makes no sense. Plenty of us care about our jobs. We don't have to be pulled off the office manager or a co-worker every week.

Fight club: Tensions are brewing behind the scenes as big summer-signings Balotelli and Boateng testified
The fact is, fourth is not good enough for City, and certainly not for the most expensive members of the squad. Roberto Mancini has assembled a cast of high maintenance egomaniacs with a point to prove. Do you think they wish to be perceived as men who are happy with fourth?
Carlos Tevez was part of a Manchester United team that won league titles and reached the Champions League final, but because he was a squad player and not the centre of the universe, he walked across town to their most hated rivals.
For all his goals and influence at City, do you think when he sees his old team-mates, Tevez puffs out his chest and purrs, 'Look at me - I'm fourth'?
It was commentator David Coleman, in a fit of excitement about the Olympic 400 metre hurdle race in Mexico in 1968, who uttered the simple home truth about the less glorious podium finishes.
'It's David Hemery first, Gerhard Hennige second,' he announced, 'who cares who's third?'

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More people than Coleman imagined actually, because John Sherwood of Great Britain had won bronze, but while the faux pas has remained in the memory, the basic observation stands. Hemery is a Commander of the Order of the British Empire, a former Sports Personality of the Year and served as the first president of UK Athletics; John Sherwood was 37 years a PE teacher at the Firth Park Community Arts College in Sheffield. No less inspirational in his way, but you get the idea.
The riches of the Champions League have made football a sport in which coming fourth can be very lucrative. Tottenham Hotspur pipped Manchester City to it last season and were delirious. There are players throughout the Premier League for whom coming fourth would be the pinnacle of their career; and some at City, too, but they are not the ones having the fights. The big ticket items - Tevez, Mario Balotelli, Emmanuel Adebayor - came to the club to be the star turn at the biggest show in town.
It is wrong to believe they are solely money motivated. Yes, the salary is a huge part of the attraction but it comes as part of a package, including success and prestige. Fourth does not tick those boxes. Ask Cesc Fabregas.
The in-fighting at City suggests the players do not care very much for their present league position at all. They do, however, wish to look after No 1.
Talking with Mancini earlier this year, he made it clear he views the season after a World Cup as a random event. He said players can hit a wall or become very tired late in the day, and that Manchester City must be ready to pounce if that happens. He did not sound like a man aiming to pre-qualify for the Champions League next season.
So why the negativity? Why statements of such limited ambition? There will never be a better opportunity for a club from beyond the traditional elite to win the title. Chelsea have lost their way, Manchester United go from the sublime to the ordinary often in the same week, while Arsenal are without a first-class goalkeeper and have a defensive line that could be breached by an inventive six-year-old on a space-hopper.
This could be Manchester City's time and the players know it. Some would walk into other clubs, just as big, not quite as fourth. And maybe in the summer they will.



Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/footba ... z17VwUuQMV

thought provoking was how they described it

[Beeks]

No disrespect to the OS but how the fuck does Martin Samuel know what is going around inside footballers heads? (Probably not much)

Is he the new Derek Acorah?

I think one word sums up that article

Inventive

[BobKowalski]

Inventive possibly but an interesting read. I am also taken with the idea of us brawling and scrapping our way to the the title culminating in a 9 man brawl when they present the trophy with shouts of 'Its me than won it the rest of you are fucking shite"

[Dameerto]

Or speculative?

[Ted Hughes]

The word to sum it up is spot on imo but only if he'd printed it several weeks ago. He's several weeks too late. I agree totally that the players weren't happy going for 4th but that has officially changed & it's been evident that since Mancini said we were aiming higher, we've been going at teams with our attitude 100% trying to win. Any bust ups now are down to the players being right 'up for it' imo. I think everyone, including Bob, is very focused now on finishing higher than 4th.

I think Martin Samuels is a good writer & although he's off the mark with us sometimes, the's no malice in it, unlike most others.

[The Foggy Blue]

It's not that bad actually. I was expecting worse.

"The squad is full of winners, they're not happy being 4th"

[joe_bowker]

Still a lot of the season left to play.

Fourth? Yes. However 3 points off the top with over 20 games to go is pretty good going in my eyes.

[brite blu sky]

The thing is that his whole premise and story is based on the idea that City are going for 4th. Now if you believe that just because that is what Bob has stated publicly then you are probably the kind of person that believes what baconface says publicly. It is a complete non-starter and is just fodder for all the fans who read the papers to apparently get the low down on other teams.
There is no way that the club or Mancini would give the press a stick to beat us with by publicly stating we are going for the title, they would never hear the last of it throughout the whole season.
As it is only a public position anyway it has nothing at all to do with what is said or goes on internally in the club and between the players and manager.

[Dubciteh]

The word to sum it up is spot on imo but only if he'd printed it several weeks ago. He's several weeks too late. I agree totally that the players weren't happy going for 4th but that has officially changed & it's been evident that since Mancini said we were aiming higher, we've been going at teams with our attitude 100% trying to win. Any bust ups now are down to the players being right 'up for it' imo. I think everyone, including Bob, is very focused now on finishing higher than 4th.

I think Martin Samuels is a good writer & although he's off the mark with us sometimes, the's no malice in it, unlike most others.

spot on as always ted.

[patrickblue]

I'm a bit bemused by this whole thing about Mancini saying he thinks Chelsea will win it and City are going for fourth. It seems to have been taken by the media as his true feelings and intent. To me it is so obviously mind games, of course he's going for the title and of course he believes he can win it, he's just taking the pressure off himself and the players. As has been pointed out, this is all several weeks too late, it would have made some sense when the team was being set up so defensively and Chelsea were a million points clear at the top, but thats no longer the case. We're under the microscope all the time, and will have to deal with it.

[Fish111]

while Arsenal are without a first-class goalkeeper and have a defensive line that could be breached by an inventive six-year-old on a space-hopper.

Another journo, though the only one i usually respect, writing something that is his summary of events he dreamt up with while sitting in an office in Canary Wharf in London. Though the quote above made me chuckle.

[john@staustell]

I'm a bit bemused by this whole thing about Mancini saying he thinks Chelsea will win it and City are going for fourth. It seems to have been taken by the media as his true feelings and intent. To me it is so obviously mind games, of course he's going for the title and of course he believes he can win it, he's just taking the pressure off himself and the players. As has been pointed out, this is all several weeks too late, it would have made some sense when the team was being set up so defensively and Chelsea were a million points clear at the top, but thats no longer the case. We're under the microscope all the time, and will have to deal with it.

Quite right Patrick, Mancini was only ever going for first this season.

Martin Samuel was about the only journo to talk sensibly about us in the last 2 years. I guess now others have started doing it he feels like he needs to break the trend!

Maybe he can rewrite it 2nd January when we're 1st?

[Lev Bronstein]

Very interesting take on events.

Also interesting is Mancini insisting Chelsea will win the title.

Had he said Arsenal would win it, then, he would be admitting that they dicked us good and proper and are far superior.

Saying U****d will win and everyone would underline our inability to beat them at home and he would be admitting that the old order is still in place, plus we'd lynch him. If he says City are going to win just makes him an easy target.

But, saying Chelsea are going to triumph reminds everyone how we deservedly beat them and isn't confessing any inferiority. Imagine a reporter saying to Bobby, "How can you say Chelsea are going to win the prem when you've beaten them?" Cue enigmatic smile and shrug of shoulders.

Could be that Bobby's learning fast.