WELL, that's me put in my place, then. For half-a-century I believed that I supported one of England's major football clubs. What a fool I've been. Manchester City are no such thing. They are a little football club - at least according to a certain Nicolas Anelka. And if he says so, it must be true. After all, he did play for the Blessed Blues, didn't he?
The French striker, a legend in his own mind, doesn't appear to be a happy chappie at the moment (nothing new there, then). He thinks he should be the star turn with the greatest club on the planet, when in fact he's turning out for Turkish side Fenerbahce.
Anelka believes he's been dealt a bum hand, and blames the former Liverpool manager Gerard Houllier for not giving him a permanent contract after his loan spell at Anfield four years ago.
This is how Anelka explained his descent from world super-star to Turkish exile. "He (Houllier) only told me at the last minute that he had no intention of keeping me, so I had not been able to negotiate with other teams. Had he not snubbed me, I would not have had to play with minor clubs."
Of course every fan of the Blessed Blues knows which "minor club" Anelka graced with his presence following that loan spell. And he came to us for a minor fee, as well. A whopping é13.5m paid out to Paris Saint Germain. That's a sizeable investment to make for one of soccer's minor clubs, don't you think?
Of course we Blue Mooners should have guessed that, in his mind, Anelka was down-sizing himself when he pitched up in 2002. We only had to glance at his history. An 18-year-old wonder-kid at Arsenal. A transfer from Highbury to Real Madrid for é23m - a world record fee at that time - and a return to PSG for a further é22m.
Debate
Thanks to the persuasive powers of Kevin Keegan, we acquired Anelka for é13.5m. What a bargain.
I wouldn't have paid 13.5m PENCE for that French sulk-pot. And I'm not being clever with hindsight. I upset many of my fellow City fans at the time by stating that having Anelka in your dressing room was the equivalent of dropping a fox into a chicken coop.
That Anelka debate is still on-going, even though he is no longer with us. There are City fans who still believe that he shouldn't have been allowed to leave. I'm still in the opposite corner. Anelka, to my mind, was the biggest waste of money in the club's history, with only Steve Daley's é1.4m transfer from Wolves in 1979 running him close.
I watched Anelka closely during his time in blue, observing him when he scored or missed a sitter. His reaction to both was total indifference. And the reaction of his team-mates was the same. My reading of the situation was that we had a player who didn't want to be there and team-mates who didn't want him there either.
In all my years as a Blue, no City player has ever made my blood boil to the extent that Anelka did.
When he left for Fenerbahce, I prayed that English football had seen the back of him for good.
But now I have an uneasy feeling that Anelka is about to return. If Harry Redknapp can rustle up the money, Anelka will be back in the Premiership this coming season with Portsmouth. Should that happen, it will only prove that some managers never learn.
Does Redknapp seriously believe that if Arsenal, Real Madrid and City weren't big enough for the miserable Frenchman then Portsmouth will be? You won't change Anelka, Harry.
Perhaps I'm doing nasty Nic a disservice. Perhaps he's finally seen the light. Perhaps after being forced to play for all those minor outfits, he regards Portsmouth as the major club he's been dreaming of joining all his life. And perhaps that was a pig I saw flying outside the kitchen window.
What do you think? Have your say.
Comments
Login or Register to comment
COULD NOT AGREE MORE! ANELKA GIVES MERCENARIES A BAD NAME.
Could'nt agree more, always disliked the man even when he played for us. Anelka never could understand there was no I in team.
Sorry,although Anelka only ever thought of himself and is going though the same illusions of grandeur that a certain midfielder of ours is going through, Anelka always gave 100% to the cause.
He was class without a doubt,did score some great goals and although I wouldn't want him back I am sure he has more quality than the likes of Dickov,Vassell and Sibierski up front. The biggest problem we had with Anelka was he had no players at the club who were bigger than him and that was the greatest shame.
paul hince, the biggest waste of money? are you having a laugh, he was good value for money. i think everyone knows the list of players that kk bought which were a waste of money, some have gone but others have stayed. but i wouldnt say anelka was in that list because no city fan would have thought when we were in division 2 that five years later we would have anelka in our team.
oh my god what a plum you are.....stay in turkey at least you get the weather......your going on about minor clubs, then you say you want to move to pompey......hahahaha
(but you can guarentee that he will score against us cos thats the kind of luck we have)
HAHAHA......always thought he should have been on a stage instead of a pitch
clearly you are in the minority.
no-on ever thought he'd be mister happy-go-lucky, jack the lad, dressing room joker did they ? you knew what you were getting. i actually thought his efforts at city were significantly better than some at city at the time and he did have a touch of class. we sold him at a loss for panic reasons and didnt replace him. with berkovic and swp around him we looked half decent. what exactly did we have last year??
alan hansen for one, has always said you dont have to like your team mates - you just need to do your job. for the sitters he did miss he still banged in plenty of goals froma feeble service mostly so why slate him for slatings sake. clearly anelka is wrong when he stated that he wants top level european football and maybe thinking of going to prtsmouth. but jow different is that to distin and barton who state their nneds are the same yet will happily go to boro or portsmouth? to say he made your blood boil more than any other city player is comical when you consider the oafs we have suffered / laughed at in the recent past.
the incredible sulk will never change, miserable sour and completeley bad to hav in any dressing room, but we wasnt to know that , wen we first signed him but we liv n learn by mistakes like this and it will be funny to sit bak and watch him sestroy some1 elses dressing room, pompy are welcome to longface, and portsmouth are startin to remind me of spurs bidding for ppl who r just way out of there league i.e. distin,sol campbell,anelka(even though he is miserable as hell) i think there just tryin to make themselves look ambitious to attract attention , there rubbish , they scraped relegation by the skin of there teeth , and tottenham hav had 1 gud year like everton did that time, and ipswich remember.wasnt it funny that duff went to newcastle, for 5 mil , wen tottenham were in there with a 9-11mil bid. sum big club spurs are.
Anelka was the best player we have seen playing for city in the last decade, no question about it. i know he wasnt the most commited to the team, but he still came up with the goals and had we kept both Anelka and Wright-Phillips, i know we would now be preparing for a season in Europe. Anelka was one of Keegans better signings even if the amount was a bit excessive. Since Anelka left we havent had a striker scoar over 10 goals. However i still hate his guts and i hope to see him join Portsmouth and then we will show him whos a minor club!!
Hince I have been slagging you off something rotten these last few weeks, but of late you seemed to have hit a purple patch in your career. Well said.
I think Anelka is the best striker I've ever seen play for City. And yes I saw Francis Lee and Gordon Davies
altho i can see hince's point of view....i still loved having the elk at maine rd. i remember pinching myself when first seeing him in blue. didnt help that he had fowler along side him and after berkovic left, his supply line was cut off leaving him visibly fustrated and chasing hopeful balls. he may not have been our greatest signing but i for one enjoyed having nico at the club.....in particular his wristband on his elbow!!
Have to agree with everything you say here Paul. And who was the agent who brought him here - something he was expecting us all to be grateful for just a week ago? Yes, the same one who was demanding 100,000 pounds for himself for Joey's "renegotiation fee"!
I think Nicolas Anelka was a good striker but sometimes he was not that botherod in matchers he was gredy he wanted a lot of money now we have got some good strikers like Dickov,Cole,Vassell,Samaras and Corridi
Yes your right always gave 35%! Only problem was that was a much better return than other players 110%!
This just sums up what is now the modern day sterotypical footballer. Barton, Distin now following suit , they all need a reality check. And they wonder why the crowds are dwindling. Sick of it.
What a sad man.He just sums up the modern day footballer.No loyalty,money grabbing,thinks they are above everything and above everyone.What makes these people is the club chairmen and directors for paying and pandering to these demagogic demands so easily.Long gone are the days when the players took time to talk to and sign autographs to the people who are the lifeblood of the club.They would turn up to the ground well before the game ,they would gladly go to supporters club meetings.Not now it is beneath them. I also feel that the people who are running our club are loosing sight of the fact that CITY is the football club of the mainly working class and not for the YUPPIE PRAWN SANDWICH EATERS so do something quickly before you loose even more season ticket holders.Give us a CITY SOCIAL that doesnt cost an arm and a leg before weve put our bums on our seat.
Anelka's comments are easy to understand when you realise that, so far as people on the continent are concerned, City ARE a minor club. Why do you think they refer to United as 'Manchester'? Nobody in Europe is really aware of the traditions of a club like City, unlike a club like Liverpool which Anelka had set his heart on signing for permanantly. Similarly Turks would consier Fenerbahche a massive club - but the rest of Europe don't. do they?
First my apologies to SP. Now I know why he was so happy to see he back of Anelka. The fact remains he was one of our best ever strikers (not one on one however!). I suppose in a way the fact he is damaged goods is the only reason we captured him at City. If the poor boy could get his head straight perhaps he could be up there with Shevchenko, but Nico your a mentalist and you're going to Portsmouth! Harry must have a bigger ego than Anelka if he thinks he's going to change him.
given some of the nuggests he was playing with i didnt think he did too badly, without him we would have gone down i think. More importantly, can't we just move on?
Absolutely agree.
Anelka wanted to play in Europe well he's had that a few times and his agent(s) (brother(s)) have made a lot of money out of his transfers.
And as for actually playing in Europe, if he was as good as people think, what happened with the 'one on one' chances against Groclin which he missed and which ultimately ensured that we didn't get a chance to go any further in the UEFA Cup.
And as for giving 100%, don't make me laugh.
Anelka was a tosser but he was still class , his goals kept us up when we had him. its a pity we could not have kept him but his attitude is atrocious. he has problems whereever he goes , love to see him back in the prem though , he get abuse every where he goes .
Anelka was the classiest forward I have ever seen in a City shirt,my first game at Maine Road was in 1958.Manchester City are a major football club who unfortunately over the years has been run by people with a little club mentality.
Mr. Hince clearly forgot Anelka's celebrating with the fans on many occasions, notably the 3-1 win over Utd at Maine Rd. Did he ever meet and talk to Anelka outside the ground, he was a gentleman who never refused an autograph. Can Hince not remember Anelka's goals, did he ever see him miss a penalty. Perhaps if we had got someone half decent to play alongside him rather than the disgraceful Fowler he might have stayed. Yes Anelka has made some daft comments, but with him in the side he could conjure something out of nothing. This year Dickov and Sibierski up front, don't make me laugh.
Portsmouth will be a bigger club than City in the next couple of seasons.
The thing is City are not a big club, big fan base yes but club NO.
We need to be finishing in the top 6/7 every season to be classed as that.
The problem as ever with city is always lack of funds.
Unless we can splash millions like Spurs have recently add that to Newcastle over the years and now Pompy we are falling even further behind.
Unless things change we will always be a team that finishes in the bottom half maybe relegation followed by winning the English second league etc etc.
WE NEED MONEY
How can a club like Pompy attract a Russian millionaire? What did they have to offer him, would he not want to own a club like our own. In contrast to pompy we were a much bigger club than them before his millions arrived.
If we are that big a club we would have possible investors lining up.