GARRY Cook has had to learn quickly that multinational businesses and Premier League clubs are two very different beasts.

Making the switch from Nike to City has required a lot of upheaval - and not just moving his family several thousand miles from the United States to the United Kingdom.

In his first month as the Blues' executive chairman, Cook has had to get to grips with the unique and baffling ways of the international football transfer market.

After 12 years moving up through the ranks at Nike, where he rose to become a senior marketing executive, his early days with the Blues came as a culture shock.

But having passed his first two major tests - bringing in a new manager in Mark Hughes and completing the £19m club-record signing of Jo - the 45-year-old is setting his sights towards making City a force to be reckoned with.

Looking back at the challenges he faced when he started work at City five weeks ago, Cook said: "When you peel back the onion, there are a few different layers!

"Maybe I underestimated some of the challenges and issues, but overall, I'm enjoying it. As I said to Mark the other day, we haven't lost yet! That's good news.

"But I'm looking forward to the season starting, and that's when we'll start to see the impact of some of the work that the executive team are putting in."

Cook has to perform a tricky balancing act, ensuring that City are run on sensible financial lines, while allowing Hughes enough clout in the transfer market to push for success.

Hughes himself has been coy when asked about City's targets for the season ahead, only stating that he wants to improve on last season's ninth-place finish.

But having taken Blackburn into the Premier League's top six in 2006 on a smaller budget than he has at Eastlands, Hughes is aiming every bit as high as Cook.

The City executive chairman acknowledges that Hughes' impressive record in the transfer market was one of the main reasons for bringing him to Eastlands from Ewood Park.

Cook said: "I look more at the economics than the emotion. From my standpoint, it was probably one of the major factors in Mark's appointment. He's fiscally very responsible, he's extremely astute.

Expensive

"We've had conversations about things and he's said: `Hmm, I'm not so sure; that seems a little expensive.'

"You know when a manager says that, he's got a conscience.

"I think we have to be responsible. Mark has a great record in that respect. I don't think that record is going to be changed.

"He knows that you can't have 100 players in your squad, so there are going to be trades, there are going to be new players coming in and players going out. That's football."

Those trades have started in earnest over the last few days, with five senior squad members departing - Andreas Isaksson, Sun Jihai, Paul Dickov, Emile Mpenza and Geovanni - as well as the arrival of Jo.

Cook will go into the transfer market to try to secure Hughes' wanted players a lot wiser after all he learned completing the Jo deal.

An extraordinarily complex transfer was made all the more difficult for Cook because negotiations were almost complete when he walked into the City job.

With the Blues set to smash their transfer record - the £13m they paid to Paris Saint Germain for Nicolas Anelka in 2002 - Cook wanted to be absolutely sure that the Blues were doing the right thing.

And that, the executive chairman admits, was the chief reason that the transfer was not completed until a month after he arrived.

Cook said: "I think I need to take some sort of responsibility for that.

"Being new to transfers and the Premier League and the Football Association regulations, I had to carry out my own due diligence on behalf of the club.

"These signings are very, very complex. We were signing a Brazilian from a Russian club.

"I contacted the Premier League and the FA and I slowed everything down until I felt we were all doing the right thing.

"It was really me and my naivety that slowed it down more than anything else, but I thought it was the right thing to do for the club.

"It turned out that the result was equally exciting, in as much as we got one of the great future players in world football playing at Manchester City."

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