The Saga Of Man City

[Lucifer Sam]

On a day when United claim their 17th league title, neighbours City look to be on the verge of complete meltdown after a 8-1 humiliation at the hands of Middlesbrough. This season looked promising for the blues after a good start, particularly with their home form but since the new year, City have rarely won. Their aspirations for a UEFA cup place vanished with loses at Birmingham and Fulham recently and poor 0-0s against Wigan and Bolton prior to those games. The 6 points taken off United at the end of the day counted for nothing, only local bragging rights. Which now look feeble after today's result. United fans will once again revel in their view that City mean nothing anymore. A view most other football supporters are rapidly beginning to share.

Cut back to early December, City were sitting 3rd in the table after another rousing home win, this time 4-2 over Bolton. Sven was indeed the man who would take the club forward onto greater things. Along with Shinawatra's investment in the club, everything looked to be going City's way for once and finally they were shedding that typical City tag which has so plagued them for the last 25 years. All this optimism masked a problem within the club - their away form was nowhere near the home form and was puzzling. A heavy loss to Chelsea - 6-0 early on brought a certain England defender crashing back down to Earth and seemed to give the team a wake up call. And still there was the League Cup and FA Cup rounds to look forward to in the new year. A 2-0 loss to a 10 man resilient and well organised Spurs side saw them dumped out of the League Cup and an all too familar embarrasing defeat to Sheffield United ended their FA cup hopes. This saw a major downturn in the team's performance from then on. Enter the derby at Old Trafford in February. This was all set up for a memorable United victory and of course the tribute to the Busby Babes. Unexpectedly City won and life for the blues under Sven was great again. A 2 week much needed break followed and then the battle for 4th or 5th place with Everton was next. At home too. Everton won the match all too easily but still it wasn't the end of the world.....Or was it? Something was going wrong but did anyone really expect what was coming?

Just 3 wins followed up to the end of the season. Shinawatra was stirring up trouble with comments about end of season reviews and Sven's position at the club, certain players it was rumoured received letters saying he didn't think they were good enough etc. Clearly this has had a hugely negative effect on the team as a whole. Their last game at home saw a 2-0 lead turn into a 2-3 loss and by fulltime a quarter full stadium for the end of season lap of honour. Shinawatra was reported to have been livid at presenting the youth team to 3000 odd fans who stayed in the ground to see their FA Youth Cup trophy and 700 delirious Fulham fans drowning out all and sundry.

It ended today at Middlesbrough. Thrashed 8-1. From a promising start and hopeful future early on in the season to the laughing stock of Manchester and if it wasn't for Derby's dreadful form, possibly the premiership by the end of it. City are once again in turmoil. Rumours of players revolt, other clubs cherry picking the likes of Richards, Dunne, Petrov, Johnson and Hart. Shinawatra has publicly stated he won't be spending huge sums of money for transfers this summer, this really is a serious cause for concern as its looking increasingly doubtful they'll have any decent first team players left. Are City really ever going to be taken seriously? Will they ever get rid of the joke club tag? At the moment, as a supporter since the 70s, I am disgusted at today's result. This is the culmination of this season. Being literally walked over. Any team loses away, but 8-1? That really is unacceptable for any league club.

Who is ultimately to blame for this complete collapse? And will City survive it? Presently I'm not so sure they will. Next season was going to be the big one for us fans, a few new players in and a proper realistic assault at europe. Now its looking like the big one for all the wrong reasons.

Anyway, had to get that off me chest, roll on summer...............

[Dave Wells]

We going shopping for Downing, Bullard and Berbatov for a start !

[Lucifer Sam]

Dave, as much as I admire your loyalty, mine was tested to its very core yesterday.

[bristolian]

You were massively punching above your weight before Xmas anyway. I think you need to get real- finishing 10th or 11th is exactly where you should be. I agree the 8-1 must have been hard to take, and some of the players are obviously to blame, but try to put it in context and see the bigger picture. Turning on the team and showing negativity does no-one any good, and it affects the team. Shinawatra is the problem, pre and simple. So is over-expectation. Remember playing Gillingham and Colchester in league 1?

[Androm]

Shinawatra has the money which he will be spending it on a manager over the summer. I'm not sure Sven is a great manager, his signings have been so and so.

A better manager and a few good signings and City will be higher in the league next season.

[Androm]

Forgot to say: Personally, I think the players let Sven-Goran Eriksson down in their 8-1 defeat. I think most of them need a good slapping around the head and a pay cut. Although I don't think his a great manager, he did some good and the players should have won the last match for him.

[Robches]

I think I can safely say that Man City have regained their title of Premiership Comedy Champions. Sorry Newcastle fans, you were in the running for a long time, but despite Tiny Tears' best efforts ("we are shite and I haven't got a clue what to do about it, we'll never be a big club, the Premiership's boring etc etc etc") you have been pipped at the post.

Sven will pocket his bung and go somewhere hot (he never even bought a house in the area, he lived in a hotel, but at least the local escort girls will miss him), Shinawatra will continue to think he knows what he's doing (as long as he can keep out of a Thai prison) and Big Phil Scolari will piss himself laughing and keep the hell away.