FM09 / Man City

I was thinking earlier, I wonder how cash happy Man City will be in the game, now that they are supposedly the richest club in the world?

Obviously nobody can answer this until the demo/game is released but it'll be interesting to see how much transfer money you'll have at your disposal.

I imagine also that the game developers have probably had to have a hard think about that one also.

i reckon a transfer kitty of at least 150 million

I think they have reworked finances so hopefully it will be reflected properly in the game.

more like £1B in the transfer funds

I think it will be like Chelsea was when Roman took over.

I'm sure they will, although I do hope they include a system to dictate who would realistically want to join them or any other club that has just assumed a new billionaire owner(s).

IRL, we've seen several top players say they wouldn't join Man City, despite the incredible amounts of money they can offer clubs, players and their agents.

IRL, we've seen several top players say they wouldn't join Man City, despite the incredible amounts of money they can offer clubs, players and their agents

That's determined by a player's loyalty attribute and favourite clubs tab. It's like Villa at Valencia. He has said he will never leave the club despite being offered the chance to join Chelsea a few seasons back, no doubt on double his wages.

It must be tempting though, having a club give you a blank cheque and say, "I can write all sorts of numbers on this thing".

Actually, I think I'll go and dig out my Fisher price toy digger I got when I was 6 and see if I can hit a rich stream of oil in Kuwait. If I play it right I'll be a billionaire this time next week.

Actually, I think I'll go and dig out my Fisher price toy digger I got when I was 6 and see if I can hit a rich stream of oil in Kuwait. If I play it right I'll be a billionaire this time next week.

Then you can buy Newcastle United!

Forgot about the loyalty/favourite clubs. It would be good though, in addition to that, if you could influence the player's decision to join your club by discussing where you want to take the club, where you expect to be in the next two seasons, etc.

Of course, this could only happen when a player does not want to join but is seeking a move from the club anyway.

I guess the downside is that everyone would say whatever was necessary to get the player to join, so it probably wouldn't work.

Didnt Miles say that he was currently playing as Man City and seeing what he could do with them or was i dreaming that?!?

Didnt Miles say that he was currently playing as Man City and seeing what he could do with them or was i dreaming that?!?

Latest podcast he said he was testing the latest version of how Man City are in game.

I think the expectations you give the board before the season starts should have an effect of which kind of player you can attract. If you tell your board you're aiming for a mid-table finish and the board thinks this is fine then a player like Eto'o (just an example) wouldn't want to join you because he wants to play for a club and a manager which is aiming to win the leauge. No matter how much money you can give him.

Man City will certainly an interesting "Challenge" on FM09.

In previous FM's £150M would get you, maybe, 2 world-class players.

Maybe on FM09 we can buy 3...

They've already got Robinho as well. They'll be really difficult to beat in the game I reckon.

Well the City owners have (reportedly) said Hughes has £100m to spend a year...which is not that much actually. What I'm expecting is a relatively small budget (50-100m say, for a CL place as an expectation) with the option to request extra money.

And I'd like to reiterate what a few others have said - Man City aren't going to have a vastly-inflated reputation. They'll be able to sign decent players but except Villa, Kaka, Torres to reject City every time until they (you?) actually win something. And expect that to be a challenge, because City's squad still has some holes in it, and the back-up players are still bottom-half Premier League standard.

Well, don't you guys remember the days where the chairman would ask for a marquee signing - someone to inject a bit of enthusiasm?

It could be a similar set up to that. A decent enough kitty of £50m, a healthy bank balance and the odd "buy me a CRonaldo toy"?

I think that'd be great, anyway. Besides, I don't think Sparky is the sort of manager to throw money at big names just because he can. Robinho, whoever it was that pulled the strings, whilst being a big name - is still very, very young and of course exceptionally talented. So, despite what I've said, Sparky would see the promise in bringing him on board. Though, honestly, would he have joined City if he didn't burn the bridge back to Madrid? No clue.

As far as i'm concerned it's all paper talk, and until they put their money where their mouth is they should have a very ordinary budget! As for Robinho, first impressions count, and the impression they wanted to give was that they would be spending fortunes, that might well happen, but until it does SI shouldn't go overboard with the transfer kitty.

Does anyone remember the team Chelsea were touted as having when Abram took over? It never happened, Chelsea have spent a lot, but nowhere near as much as everyone said they would, AFAIC the same will happen with Citeh.

Man City will certainly an interesting "Challenge" on FM09.

In previous FM's £150M would get you, maybe, 2 world-class players.

Maybe on FM09 we can buy 3...

you're right about that. When in theory you should be able to get most players for about £50-60 million. Not many clubs in this day and age would say no to that.

I tried to buy Fabregas in 08 and arsenal wanted £170 million. I only had £110 million so got him for that plus 30% sell on fee. Far to costly lol

I dunno about transfer kitty but after the last podcast miles said he was doing a test of city's finances for fm09 so must have been a special case in the game

does anyone knw wen the demo is actually cumin out lol i cnt wiat for it

so man city will be in the top 3 richest clubs of the world?

does anyone knw wen the demo is actually cumin out lol i cnt wiat for it

A couple of weeks before the full release date apparently but please remember the content of this thread is discussing Man City in FM2009, not when the demo is to be released

I also think it'll be around £100M but the board might be a little too eager for success with that perhaps so it might be the kind of job you can lose fairly quickly.

so man city will be in the top 3 richest clubs of the world?

I've heard IRL that they are officially the richest club in the world. Their owners wealth makes Abramovich look like a lottery winner.

I've heard IRL that they are officially the richest club in the world. Their owners wealth makes Abramovich look like a lottery winner.

The owners' total wealth is estimated at $1Trillion (£560Billion)

Or something like that.

They would probably toss (heads or tails - before you get clever ) Abramovich for his money.

Technically City are not the richest club in the world. Their debt is paid off but they're still just top-20 as they were before even Thaksin. Sheikh Mansour is the richest club owner, but his intention, it has already become apparent, is to give City the money for what he wants to do with them, as and when they need the money - so whenever City have money pumped in, it is because it will be immediately spent. It's just that media sources such as Sky Sports News have a habit of acting as though owner and club are one and the same, and will judge clubs' wealth based on their owners, which propagated the whole "richest club in the world" idea. We're still not a very wealthy team compared to the Champions League regulars, it's just that we aren't going to have to spend any of our own money on the expensive stuff now.

What I want to know is if SI will include the expansion of Eastlands. Obviously it hasn't been confirmed as happening yet, but the experts believe that negotiations are at an advanced stage already, and the owner and his chairman have made their ambitions public. So if they do get the go-ahead (for those who don't know, the improvements are: stadium upgraded to roughly 78,000 to equal Old Trafford, training ground and youth academy both moved to on-site locations and substantially improved, entire area renovated including a five-star hotel built...which probably sums up most of the improvements required to classify as a UEFA 5-star stadium), will SI add the improvements in a patch to be completed in the 2009 summer break as a scheduled coded event, or will they be unable to add it until the next game by which time the improvements should be under construction?

Man City's stadium already looks amazing. I wish Stamford Bridge was as nice

At 78,000, it would look even more amazing. I wonder how controversial an issue all of this stuff about Man City was during game development. Nobody really knows what they are going to be like in terms of transfer expenditure until Summer 2009. I know when the transfer window re-opens in January they can buy again but I can't imagine any huge £30M transfers going through or anything.

As for their stadium plans, I reckon if you ask for stadium expansion in the game then you'll get it no questions asked. It's tempting to think that they won't throw money around but who really knows. In FM08, you could get a hefty top-up on your transfer funds just by asking for it, which rarely happens in the game. It was the same with Arsenal I believe as they were so rich.

I have no idea how City will handle in-game, but I believe that, in spite of what all the papers are saying, Mansour's plans are to build a structured and planned long-term investment by spending a fair deal in the short-term and letting it mature. I don't think he's going to throw money at the club time and time again. In Football Manager terms, I think this would be equivalent to raising the stadium to a 70,000 seater (which took me three years of straight success in FM08), and raising training ground and youth facilities to 20s, and then not accepting most other requests for extra cash for various things. There are reports that he wants to see at least one great player join every year, and is willing to pay for that, but he's already sacked one guy for making wild claims about City's transfer spending - the origin of all the stories which are still persisting to this day about City signing Torres, Kaka and Villa all in one go in January, and all the other crazy stories - and stated that he has much more restricted plans for City's growth - he wants to give them a decent platform to stand on and then let the team build itself up over several years. City aren't going to go dream-team buying...I'd be more expectant of seeing a player such as Gareth Bale or Roque Santa Cruz sign than Messi, or Henry, or Cristiano Ronaldo (who the fans would hate anyway). In truth I'd be a little disappointed if the board constantly accepts requests for money for everything. If we're going by accuracy to RL, I'd rather see them make improvements at the start of the game and then tone down their spending.

It will be interesting to see if "the other Ronaldo" (by that, I meant the Brazilian) does sign for City in RL...and where he will go in-game, since he's a free agent. Perhaps he should have City added as a favourite club, the newspapers have been reporting his comments saying he wants to come to Eastlands virtually every day now for months, and now apparently Jo is badgering Hughes to sign him

There are rumours about him going to PSG as well. He's said in interviews that he loves Paris, has a flat there and everything. It'd attract so much attention if he were to join Man City.

I wonder if we'll be getting random billionaire owners buying up clubs in game?

It'll be interesting to see how the City case has affected SI's coding. I hope 09 doesn't become flooded with billionaire takeovers. In truth, even in RL I don't think we're going to see more than two PL teams plus maybe Charlton being bought out in this season by rich owners (by the looks of it, Newcastle are going to be bought by a consortium even poorer than Ashley) and I think that after this season, the football market will settle down again to the previous point where club takeover talk is uncommon if not rare.

As far as i'm concerned it's all paper talk, and until they put their money where their mouth is they should have a very ordinary budget! As for Robinho, first impressions count, and the impression they wanted to give was that they would be spending fortunes, that might well happen, but until it does SI shouldn't go overboard with the transfer kitty.

Does anyone remember the team Chelsea were touted as having when Abram took over? It never happened, Chelsea have spent a lot, but nowhere near as much as everyone said they would, AFAIC the same will happen with Citeh.

Chelsea have spent around £500million in the last 6 years - that is one heck of a lot of money.

It'll be interesting to see how the City case has affected SI's coding. I hope 09 doesn't become flooded with billionaire takeovers. In truth, even in RL I don't think we're going to see more than two PL teams plus maybe Charlton being bought out in this season by rich owners (by the looks of it, Newcastle are going to be bought by a consortium even poorer than Ashley) and I think that after this season, the football market will settle down again to the previous point where club takeover talk is uncommon if not rare.

I think maybe if there is a takeover every 3-4 seasons, that would be okay as the leagues tend to look fairly different in that sort of time anyway, so a new super power would probably be welcomed by most.

I agree that in real life, it looks unlikely that there'll be as many takeovers from now on. Credit crunch aside, buying a PL team must be becoming less inviting to consortiums and billionaires, when they see that it is going to be increasingly difficult to break into the top four and achieve league, european and domestic cup success when there are so many other clubs with the same idea in mind.

It will be interesting to see how it works out in the game but my assumption is SI would write the finance modelling in the game based on the extremes that existed when they started coding FM09. As this was probably the start of the year the extremes at the top end would be Chelsea, Real Madrid etc. so this sudden introduction of a new extreme may be difficult to implement realistically as a financial model is likely to be quite a complicated piece of coding.

Maybe its flexible enough to account for the RL changes, maybe not.

Not that I'll be worrying about it...I'll be off working with a wage budget of 2k and transfer kitty of £0 in the lowest reaches of football

Technically City are not the richest club in the world. Their debt is paid off but they're still just top-20 as they were before even Thaksin. Sheikh Mansour is the richest club owner, but his intention, it has already become apparent, is to give City the money for what he wants to do with them, as and when they need the money - so whenever City have money pumped in, it is because it will be immediately spent. It's just that media sources such as Sky Sports News have a habit of acting as though owner and club are one and the same, and will judge clubs' wealth based on their owners, which propagated the whole "richest club in the world" idea. We're still not a very wealthy team compared to the Champions League regulars, it's just that we aren't going to have to spend any of our own money on the expensive stuff now.

I'll easily agree with you that tabloid TV channels like Sky Sports etc can be very inaccurate and sensational...

But Man City is the world's richest club. City is a 'private limited company' with shares. Thaksin bought 75% of the shares in 2007, and Abu Dhabi Group bought that 75% off him this year.

This means that, technically, Man City is a subsidiary of the Abu Dhabi United Group Investment and Development Limited.

This is the same that happened to O2 when they were bought by Telefonica. Or more recently, when Washington Mutual was bought by JPMorgan Chase.

They do have their own yearly balance sheet, with an allocated funding and expeditures/income (ideally the latter being higher). Presumably any excess money that City makes will be fed back to Abu Dhabi Group, and following year they can get more allocated money for that year's budget.

To summarize, as a subsidiary of Abu Dhabi Group, they are considered to have a wealth in the region of £555bn, and should be listed so (in my honest opinion) in FM09...

(And yes, I'm a Citizen hehe...)

Don't forget, as a new (and therefore untested) manager you may not be trusted with unlimited purse strings. I remember when Abramovich took over Chelsea, FM didn't give you £200million to spend or anything as ridiculous as that. You'd get it eventually, though, if you were successful.

I'm sure they will, although I do hope they include a system to dictate who would realistically want to join them or any other club that has just assumed a new billionaire owner(s).

They do, its called reputation.

True, I did forget about those sort of stats. I just though Man City might be an exception because of the lure of their wealth and potential.

True, I did forget about those sort of stats. I just though Man City might be an exception because of the lure of their wealth and potential.

I hope not...I'm hoping Man City falls somewhere between when Chelsea was taken over and when Portsmouth was.

To summarize, as a subsidiary of Abu Dhabi Group, they are considered to have a wealth in the region of £555bn, and should be listed so (in my honest opinion) in FM09...

(And yes, I'm a Citizen hehe...)

You're right of course that technically Man City Limited is now a subsidiary of Abu Dhabi United, but you forget that it is not Abu Dhabi United who have £555bn in their accounts. The £555bn is the personal wealth of Sheikh Mansour, from a variety of business outlets. That is, what he has in his bank accounts, and probably what his business assets are estimated at. Abu Dhabi does not have £555bn, and is not a subsidiary, though it is fully owned by the Sheikh; it is instead a foreign investment company which owns what money it makes, plus what money Mansour puts into its accounts - an investment company created for City, no less. If I had £1 million and bought, say, my home town club Hitchin Town F.C. for £200k (probably about what they're worth), that would not make them worth one million.

(And I'm a Citizen too, I just am too used to City's inconsistency to have grandiose ambitions for the club )

if they do have their true finances i will defo try them because it will be ace

Dont forget city wont spend all this money in one season as they cannot attract all the players they want with just the uefa cup!

Give it £70 mill. Then more if they qualify for the champs league the season after.

Technically City are not the richest club in the world. Their debt is paid off but they're still just top-20 as they were before even Thaksin. Sheikh Mansour is the richest club owner, but his intention, it has already become apparent, is to give City the money for what he wants to do with them, as and when they need the money - so whenever City have money pumped in, it is because it will be immediately spent. It's just that media sources such as Sky Sports News have a habit of acting as though owner and club are one and the same, and will judge clubs' wealth based on their owners, which propagated the whole "richest club in the world" idea. We're still not a very wealthy team compared to the Champions League regulars, it's just that we aren't going to have to spend any of our own money on the expensive stuff now.

What I want to know is if SI will include the expansion of Eastlands. Obviously it hasn't been confirmed as happening yet, but the experts believe that negotiations are at an advanced stage already, and the owner and his chairman have made their ambitions public. So if they do get the go-ahead (for those who don't know, the improvements are: stadium upgraded to roughly 78,000 to equal Old Trafford, training ground and youth academy both moved to on-site locations and substantially improved, entire area renovated including a five-star hotel built...which probably sums up most of the improvements required to classify as a UEFA 5-star stadium), will SI add the improvements in a patch to be completed in the 2009 summer break as a scheduled coded event, or will they be unable to add it until the next game by which time the improvements should be under construction?

So the size able transfer kitty and the spontaneous "Hey, I want a new football man-toy" would fit the bill nicely!

Chelsea have spent around £500million in the last 6 years - that is one heck of a lot of money.

Chelsea has cash injections in the form of interest free loans, though.

Dont forget city wont spend all this money in one season as they cannot attract all the players they want with just the uefa cup!

Give it £70 mill. Then more if they qualify for the champs league the season after.

I think that would be the best way to do it.

So the size able transfer kitty and the spontaneous "Hey, I want a new football man-toy" would fit the bill nicely!

I'm really not sure about the whole marquee signing thing. As I said earlier, they actually fired the guy who was making all the wild claims of massive signings, because they didn't intend anything like what he was claiming and he was bringing the club into disrepute after a matter of days. I can't say for certain that Hughes won't make a couple of bids for big players he has a reason to believe might be interested, but I honestly don't think that he's being told "buy a famous player every year or we'll go behind your back and do it for you" a la Abramovich and Shevchenko, etc. Rather, the owner and his chairman has made every indication that what they want to do is say to Hughes "here you are, I've just upgraded the ground and the facilities for you. Now have a decent transfer budget, and do what you want to do with it". Sheikh Mansour has stated he has faith in Hughes and will let him pick the transfer targets, and just because other chairmen go behind their managers' backs and betray them with broken promises, I'm not sure we engage cynicism mode and instantly ignore those comments without at least giving them a January transfer window to prove their honesty with.

as someone mentioned eastlands expansion i'll be interested to see how that goes - thing is eastlands/COM has a very specific design - expansion will be both an engineering mountain and something that drastically changes the skyline which will require a lot of paperwork and probably even public consultation etc. I'd also question the logic of it as the (48000?) capacity they have already rarely gets filled... I know they have money to burn but it'd be detremental to the atmosphere as well.

anyway back on game, those who've pointed out that Man City don't actually house the money, I think that's farely irrelevant - the money's still there at their beck and call, and as the game does have real-life investments and banking I think it'd be fair to put the money at the disposal of the management... but who knows maybe you'll just be able to ask for every signing you want? *shrugs*

The important thing is not how uch money they get, but WHEN they get it. If they have it from the beginning of the game then it gives them an advantage that they never had in real life due to the timing of the takeover.

anyway back on game, those who've pointed out that Man City don't actually house the money, I think that's farely irrelevant - the money's still there at their beck and call, and as the game does have real-life investments and banking I think it'd be fair to put the money at the disposal of the management... but who knows maybe you'll just be able to ask for every signing you want? *shrugs*

I wouldn't say it's irrelevant. If five years down the line City are sold again, the only money they will have is the money the club has made itself. The money Sheik Mansour has put in will almost certainly be reclaimed somehow, be it in the forms of loans (which are quite possibly already in place) or taken straight back out.

City themselves don't have access to the money themselves, so giving them a massive balance would be unrealistic. The best option (IMO) would be to have a sugar daddy chairman that can then through money at the club if and when he feels necessary.

the owners have said they have endless transfer cash. if they want the game realistic then itll be endless???!??

A couple of weeks before the full release date apparently but please remember the content of this thread is discussing Man City in FM2009, not when the demo is to be released

I also think it'll be around £100M but the board might be a little too eager for success with that perhaps so it might be the kind of job you can lose fairly quickly.

You didn't get the joke. He actually made a valid point writing this.

So when does the patch come out?

You're right of course that technically Man City Limited is now a subsidiary of Abu Dhabi United, but you forget that it is not Abu Dhabi United who have £555bn in their accounts. The £555bn is the personal wealth of Sheikh Mansour, from a variety of business outlets. That is, what he has in his bank accounts, and probably what his business assets are estimated at. Abu Dhabi does not have £555bn, and is not a subsidiary, though it is fully owned by the Sheikh; it is instead a foreign investment company which owns what money it makes, plus what money Mansour puts into its accounts - an investment company created for City, no less. If I had £1 million and bought, say, my home town club Hitchin Town F.C. for £200k (probably about what they're worth), that would not make them worth one million.

(And I'm a Citizen too, I just am too used to City's inconsistency to have grandiose ambitions for the club )

Cool, it's good being a Citizen now a days. But don't get me wrong, I've got very small hopes of City becoming the best club in the world! As you say, the only thing certain about City is change!

Yes, I can see your point about the funding for City. I don't really want to get too technical, as I'm not by any means an expert in finances mate!

But, two final points about this:

The Sheikh doesn't have all this money himself. It's controlled and by the state of Abu Dhabi, and it's placed in a sovereign wealth fund called Abu Dhabi Investment Authority. I don't know, but I presume in one way or another that Abu Dhabi United blah blah Group is connected to this.

But I think basically we agree... The guy would never tell the city chairman, "here I've got £550bn go a head and use it all!". In that sense, obviously they don't have that much money! So you're right. But what I'm trying to say is, as far as rankings of world's richest clubs, this is how it's measured and it should be this much money City have in the rankings...