Man City has just experienced a worst season under Pep Guardiola, when most rookie season 2024/25 did not meet expectations. Although spending more than 200 million pounds to supplement forces, 4 of the 5 new contracts almost did not create significant impacts.
According to Transfermarkt, summer 2024 and winter 2025, Man City has brought to Savinho, Khusanov, Vitor Reis, Omar Marmoush and Nico Gonzalez. Of these, only Marroush partly left a mark with 7 goals after 16 matches in the Premier League, the rest were faint.
Savinho could not integrate with the gameplay, while Khusanov and Reis were only potential. Nico Gonzalez has not shown the value compared to the amount of money.
French Football Weekly even paralyzed these 4 names into the “Flops” group – the failed contracts that Man City needs to liquidate before the transfer closed, partly to meet the UEFA financial regulations.
In fact, during the summer transfer window 2025, Man City pushed the prodigy Vitor Reis to Girona on a loan until the end of the 2025/26 season. In addition, they are also ready to sell Savinho to Tottenham.
Fans on social networks also pointed out that Man City's quality of shopping has been significantly down since the historic treble in 2023. Instead of the stature stars like before, the new contracts are only in potential forms, not enough to make differences immediately. Mistakes in recruiting Kalvin Phillips have also been repeated as a testament to the lack of accurate decisions.
The consequence of these inefficient deals is that Man City loses the depth of the squad. When the pillars such as Rodri, Haaland, Stones or Ake were injured in turn, the team did not have enough personnel to replace the quality, leading to a decline. In the 2024/25 season, Man City empty -handed in all competitions and only the third in the Premier League, the worst achievement of Pep Guardiola in Etihad.
With the pressure from the fans and requiring financial balance, Man City is forced to take into account the liquidation of “redundant” this summer. However, to find the output for the contracts that have not proved the value will be a difficult problem, especially when other clubs also consider more carefully in spending.
During the summer transfer period 2025, Man City brought 6 rookies including Reijnders, Ait-Nouri, Cherk, Trafford, Nylan and Bettinelli. Of these, Nypan is the young talent to invest in the future and Bettinelli is the reserve goalkeeper No. 2. People like Reijnders, Ait-Nouri, Cherki and Trafford are expected to be a new factor in the starting lineup.
It is still unclear what the possibility of these people is like. But if they are disappointed, Man City is in danger of entering the period of recession, when the force is both lacking in depth and not many stars are strong enough to make a difference at decisive moments. This will be the biggest challenge for Pep Guardiola in the journey to maintain the dominance of The Citizens in English and European football.