Nigel Rothband, The Man City Show podcast , external
As the champions of Europe, champions of England and FA Cup winners prepare to defend all of their crowns, what are Pep Guardiola’s top priorities for the first few weeks of the coming season?
One is ensuring last season’s success does not dull the appetite and hunger for more trophies.
Erling Haaland is the most feared striker in the world and gets marked accordingly. In the run-in last year this mattered less as City had players like Riyad Mahrez and Ilkay Gundogan coming from deep to support him. Pep needs to ensure Haaland gets the service he needs to enable him to get close to the scoring heights of last season.
Allowing for the fact that Mahrez and Gundogan have now moved on, Mateo Kovacic has clearly come in as a like-for-like replacement for Gundogan. A direct replacement winger for Mahrez may be the next key issue - there is still plenty of time left for City to consider their options in this transfer window.
One possibility, of course, is for Cole Palmer to continue his development as the natural replacement for Mahrez, while youngsters Rico Lewis and James McAtee also seem to be ready to make the step up to more regular places in the first-team squad during the season ahead.
