Eastlands: where a clean sheet is “holy” – De Jong

ROBERTO MANCINI has spent hundreds of millions of his owner’s pounds assembling some of the best attacking talent in the football world at Manchester City; the only question is how much we will see of them as the pragmatic Italian continues to preside over his Eastlands revolution.

Events involving Mancini this week seem to have set out a clear blueprint at the world’s wealthiest club.

Having fielded a woefully weakened, and inept, team at West Brom in their Carling Cup exit on Wednesday, Mancini was indicating that the second domestic cup competition is of no interest to him.