EastStandBlue
Life President
It'll be a lean Christmas in the Hughes household this year. Well, not exactly, but Hughes will be without a job as of this evening.
Rumours of his dismissal spread like wildfire before and during the game, Roberto Mancini's odds coming in as low as 1/6 and the board made the ominous announcement that there would be a press conference at 7:30pm. This didn't just add fuel to the fire, it chucked in some high grade explosive to the mix.
City went onto beat Sunderland 4-3 and Hughes made every effort to applaud all four stands of the City of Manchester before trudging off the pitch looking a broken man. The decision it self might not be completely understandable, but you can kind of, a little bit if you squint, see the boards reasons for doing so.
Hughes has, under tempestuous conditions, guided City to their best chance of a top four finish in decades. They have a reasonably balanced squad with an array of talent and have pulled off some great results this season... Hell, they've lost twice all season. Once against the Champions and once against a Spurs side undergoing a Redknapp Renaissance.
Hughes, however, was an inheritance of a previous board and was never truly wanted by the Saudi regime. Despite his reputation in this country, he is largely unknown overseas as a manager and has no appeal for the big name players to switch. Reasonably effective but uninspiring, he's the Darren Fletcher of the managerial community.
By installing a manager now, City have made the leap towards a Galactico's style of management. They don't care who it is, as long as the club itself is successful as a brand. Mancini is the odds on cert to take over where Hughes left off, but he's hardly a heavyweight when it comes to management. What he is, though, is a football celebrity on the continent and the simple fact of the matter is big players will want to play for him. The Italian will obviously be given a bottomless pit to spend, and you can bet your oil rich dollar that a host of names will now be linked with the club. Franck Ribery, seemingly hell bent on leaving Bayern Munich, would fit the bill of joining up and forming a triad of facial disfigurements to strike fear into the hearts and eyes of any opponents.
Some might call it a knee-jerk reaction, but to what exactly? If the club were within a shout of winning the league this year then Europe's talent might just have been interested in joining. As it stands, City look set for the Europa League and a season of slow progress. Bringing in Mancini now, as disgusting as it might be, suits the needs and requirements of the owners. Once people see past this as a footballing decision and think of it as a business decision, it becomes all the more plausible.
It's a sad indictment of Premiership football, but anybody could have seen this coming...
Rumours of his dismissal spread like wildfire before and during the game, Roberto Mancini's odds coming in as low as 1/6 and the board made the ominous announcement that there would be a press conference at 7:30pm. This didn't just add fuel to the fire, it chucked in some high grade explosive to the mix.
City went onto beat Sunderland 4-3 and Hughes made every effort to applaud all four stands of the City of Manchester before trudging off the pitch looking a broken man. The decision it self might not be completely understandable, but you can kind of, a little bit if you squint, see the boards reasons for doing so.
Hughes has, under tempestuous conditions, guided City to their best chance of a top four finish in decades. They have a reasonably balanced squad with an array of talent and have pulled off some great results this season... Hell, they've lost twice all season. Once against the Champions and once against a Spurs side undergoing a Redknapp Renaissance.
Hughes, however, was an inheritance of a previous board and was never truly wanted by the Saudi regime. Despite his reputation in this country, he is largely unknown overseas as a manager and has no appeal for the big name players to switch. Reasonably effective but uninspiring, he's the Darren Fletcher of the managerial community.
By installing a manager now, City have made the leap towards a Galactico's style of management. They don't care who it is, as long as the club itself is successful as a brand. Mancini is the odds on cert to take over where Hughes left off, but he's hardly a heavyweight when it comes to management. What he is, though, is a football celebrity on the continent and the simple fact of the matter is big players will want to play for him. The Italian will obviously be given a bottomless pit to spend, and you can bet your oil rich dollar that a host of names will now be linked with the club. Franck Ribery, seemingly hell bent on leaving Bayern Munich, would fit the bill of joining up and forming a triad of facial disfigurements to strike fear into the hearts and eyes of any opponents.
Some might call it a knee-jerk reaction, but to what exactly? If the club were within a shout of winning the league this year then Europe's talent might just have been interested in joining. As it stands, City look set for the Europa League and a season of slow progress. Bringing in Mancini now, as disgusting as it might be, suits the needs and requirements of the owners. Once people see past this as a footballing decision and think of it as a business decision, it becomes all the more plausible.
It's a sad indictment of Premiership football, but anybody could have seen this coming...
