SVEN GORAN ERIKSSON is keeping his fingers crossed some of
his eight new signings will turn out to be video stars at
Manchester City. The former England boss has spent almost
£40million of new owner Thaksin Shinawatras cash during the close
season so far. Yet he admits he has not seen many of his captures
play live and has been forced to rely on videos and the word of his
pals.
Over the past two days, he has brought in Brazilian midfielder
Elano from Shakhtar Donetsk for £8million and Fiorentinas
Bulgarian forward Valeri Bojinov for around £6m, while Real
Sociedad defender Javi Garrido has cost £1.5m and £4m Croatia
defender Vedran Corluka has arrived from Dynamo Zagreb. Previously,
he had splashed out £8.8.m on Reggina striker Rolando Bianchi,
£4.7m for midfielder Martin Petrov from Atletico Madrid, paid an
estimated £4.2m to net Switzerland Under-21 skipper Gelson
Fernandes and landed Brazilian forward Geovanni on a free. It puts
him firmly among the Premier Leagues big spenders and last night
Eriksson was poised to make Australian midfielder Mark Bresciano
his next signing.
Bresciano, 27, plays for Italian side Palermo and has told them he
is ready to join Svens revolution in a £3m deal. Eriksson has been
racing against the clock to get new players in, as he was
officially appointed only early last month. So he has been forced
to take a gamble on some of the little-known foreigners shelling
out big money in the process.
The Swede admitted: Most of the players I have never seen in
action live. But its just not possible because the season has not
even started. I have seen videos of them though and I have checked
them out with friends who have seen them play. A lot of them, the
club scouts had seen before. You can never be sure how players
will do. But it is up to me and the coaches to get them ready. I am
very confident they will do well. I saw a lot of football during
my break, yet I saw much less live football than I did in the
previous five years. I sat at home and watched four or five games
during the week.
Eriksson owned up he did not really have targets in mind when he
accepted the job at Eastlands, so has had to work hard to get deals
done. He added: I came to Manchester City very late. It all came
about very quickly just two months ago. Thats the first time
anyone spoke to me about City, so I cant say I had in my mind
which kind of players would be suitable for the club. So I had to
work very quickly and find what we thought were the right players.
But the world of agents must be a jungle. At the end, you dont
know who represents who. It has been a lot of work and phone calls.
My dream is to have eight defenders, eight midfielders and four
strikers. That is what I am working towards.
Questions have been raised about why the ex-England chief has not
tried to sign home-based players. But Eriksson insisted he has
tried notably the likes of Leighton Baines and Peter Crouch and
claimed he has been priced out. He insisted: If you try to go for
the best players, the players in the England squad for instance,
its very difficult to get them. I promise you that I tried for
maybe four and two of the clubs would not even discuss a price to
sell. The other ones were very expensive. We had some English
names but clubs wouldnt sell. There are a lot of good English
players. I know that as I had another job until a year ago! But if
we wanted to buy any of them, the price has gone over the
roof.
Eriksson has promised to try to keep a British spine running
through his City side and is pleased with home-grown star like
Micah Richards and Nedum Onuoha plus Irishmen Stephen Ireland and
Richard Dunne. Eriksson said: I dont see us having a team of
non-British players this season. We will have more than eight
British players in the squad when the season starts and thats
almost half of them.
His side host Valencia today and Eriksson revealed: We are not
ready for the season yet. How can we be ready with so little time
to prepare? We have another week though and hopefully will be
ready by then. Shinawatra has drawn up a three-year plan for his
new boss, designed to see silverware won by 2010.
The one-time Thai PM said: This season I feel we should be able to
finish in the top 10. The second season we should be aiming for the
top six and qualifying for Europe. I accept that the first year is
a learning curve, though we should start to be successful by the
third. That is what I would expect.
THE joke was on Sven Goran Eriksson yesterday, when he
asked his new Bulgarian forward Valeri Bojinov at a Press
conference: Why did you want to join Manchester United?
Red-faced Sven swiftly corrected his question to: Why did you want
to join Manchester City? But not before those present had
dissolved into laughter.
