This has been a very difficult season for Manchester City even though their fans had expected to see a lot of improvement from their team. Wealthy Abu Dhabi owners came in with a lot of money and they started placing bids for the best European players as they wanted to quickly turn Manchester City into one of the leading teams in England. Not everything worked as planned, especially after Kaka rejected the move to the Eastlands outfit and apart from the several very good players, which arrived in January, City were unable to attract any world-class players, if we don’t count Robinho, who proved that he is nowhere near the required quality.

Despite possessing a very good team, Mark Hughes struggled to take his side away from the dangerous zone in the English Premier League and this proved that money cannot buy everything. It is clear that this has been just a transition season and that the club management will severely reinforce the club this summer but something have got to change if they are to fight for the Champions League places next season. With the arrival of new players, the team lost its soul and I can only wonder what will happen next summer. The Citizens played well at the City of Manchester Stadium but they would lose even to the weakest teams in the league away from home and that has been the biggest problem. Isn’t it devastating for the team fighting for Europe to have the third worst away record in the league? This is certainly something that Mark Hughes, if he is to stay at the helm after the season ends, will have to pay special attention to as City cannot become a serious team unless they improve on the travels.

The team still have the chance to ensure European qualification as they are just one point adrift of seventh-placed West Ham but they’ve got a couple of very difficult matches remaining and could easily miss out on Europe. Should this happen, that will severely damage their chances of luring any world-class players to the club, as I don’t think that any world-class footballer would join the club that are not playing in Europe. Next summer will be very busy for City officials, while at the same time very exciting for their fans. I am sure that the majority of City fans will spend a lot of time reading soccer rumours this summer, trying to find out which of the brightest European talents will join their favourite club.