mancityblues.com

Newspapers and their websites easily influence the thinking of their readers, and they well know that to be true. They can take the most innocuous remark and turn it into something completely different with a deft flick of the pen, or the keyboard. In the last few weeks I have watched City's efforts to build a team almost from scratch ridiculed and vilified.

I am not whinging, we have set ourselves up as a club that are not satisfied merely being cannon-fodder for the top premier teams to take points off, and actually want to improve, and quickly, by buying quality players, and do so in a respectful and considered manner. That is manna from heaven for the press, who are never happy unless they can point an accusing finger at the moneybags. The fact that no other club gets the same treatment is something we will have to get used to, grin and bear.

Mr Ancelotti is a gentleman in the true sense, well respected, and has every right to promote his new club as the best in the world in his eyes. I wouldn't expect anything else. When he spoke yesterday of players not being attracted by money alone, but also passion and "other things", he is quite right - most players now will pay as much attention to the position of the club in Europe. The fact is that CL football is an important stage in any player's career, and City are not in that, or any other European competition for now so we are asking them to take quite a leap of faith in order to sign with City. Some are more than happy to do so, some believe they have bigger fish to fry. ca ne fait rien.

That's the obstacle that Cooke and Hughes have to overcome, we are untried, untested, so they have to sell us well, and our only USP (in business-speak, our unique selling point) is that we dare to spend money on chasing the dream. If they don't buy into that, then there's nobody to blame, no fingers to point, no accusations to be made, it comes down to the player's personal choice. It is always referred to as a snub, but in reality it isn't.

So, we watch and wait, will Charlie Tevez disappear up his own 'arris in a cloud of acrimony against his previous employers? Will John Terry (Mr Chelsea) drag himself off the Spanish golf course to tell the world he is a blue and always will be? (Chelsea blue of course) We are all biting our nails in case they turn us down and we end up signing nobody.

Not such a big deal unless you write for the Mirror, in actual fact. We have strengthened the squad and it won't be a disaster if we start the season as we are - we are perfectly capable of maintaining a decent challenge and moving forward and, in the meantime, if we do bring in more talent, great.

Finally, to the tune of "We're busy doing nothing" -

"So, Terry's going nowhere, isn't it just a crime, I'd like to be unhappy but.....................I really don't have the time"

Clevblue