Manchester City’s youngsters lost every single game in the inaugural tournament. The club will hope for better results next season.
Reviewing Manchester City’s Next Gen campaign
The NextGen tournament finished a fortnight ago, with Inter Milan beating Ajax on penalties in the final. Manchester City were one of four English clubs to participate, along with Aston Villa, Liverpool and Tottenham Hotspur. The tournament contained 16 teams, for club’s players at under-19 level. The organisers said that the competition was conceived not to make money, but to introduce young players to a higher level of opposition to aid their development. The step up proved too much for City’s side.
Where did they finish?
Manchester City experienced a tough campaign. The tournament was formulated like the Champions League, with a group stage followed by knockout rounds, but City did not progress beyond the group stages. City lost every single match in the group stages, and finished rock bottom of Group 1 with 0 points. Third placed Celtic, who beat them twice, had nine points, which illustrates just how far behind City were. Putting it into context, City were the only English team not to progress past the group stages, with Aston Villa, Tottenham and Liverpool all reaching the knockout tournament, with Liverpool finishing third.
Who did they play?
As well as Scottish side Celtic, in City’s group were French club Marseille, and Spanish champions Barcelona. All three sides beat City twice. City started competitively enough, losing only 2-1 at home to Barcelona, with Miguel Angel netting both goals for the Spaniards. As Barcelona were the favourites for the tournament, City were able to take heart from this narrow defeat. That hope was sapped from them however when they lost their second game 3-0 away to Marseille, and were stunned 4-2 at home by Celtic. City followed up with a 4-1 defeat to Barcelona, and lost their final games 2-1 to Marseille and Celtic. Although they ended losing each game, they could take heart from the fact they were not exactly whipping boys, with a three goal deficit the highest margin in their defeats.
Who were the standout players?
Manchester City gave plenty of playing time to young Spaniard Juan Roman Angel, who is highly rated at the club. The teenager was signed from Espanyol a couple of years back and played in their reserve side alongside Carlos Tevez last week, bagging a hat-trick. Angel, a playmaker, scored in the 4-2 loss to Celtic alongside young striker Dennis Suarez. The City captain was Dutch centre-back Karim Rekik, who has recently been loaned to Portsmouth, although he featured in midfield during the tournament. At the back, a defender who featured was Frederic Veseli, who left the club to sign for Manchester United in the January transfer window. Striker Harry Bunn, recently loaned to Oldham, was a goalscorer against Barcelona, along with English under-18 striker Jordi Hiwula.
Where do they go from here?
Now the club know what to expect from the tournament, they know what they have to do next year to improve. Andy Walsh, the academy coach, said after their elimination, “Regardless of our results, we have benefited enormously from our involvement in the tournament.” It is unlikely to be an empty promise. City will have learned a lot from the tournament, about opposing sides, but most importantly their own players. With the club’s resources, they can even afford to go and buy young players who will help them compete, although as the NextGen tournament is like a training school, winning it should not necessarily be of the utmost importance just yet. As the competition grows, so will its prestige, and it will become a bigger priority. Patrick Vieira, in his development role at City, has been in talks with organisers about helping the tournament grow, and City will want to play a prominent part in that on the pitch as well as off it.
Next season will see the tournament grow from 16 to 24 teams, with Chelsea among the new clubs to have signed up. It is hard to imagine City will go through next season losing every game, and will want to improve and even reach the knockout rounds. Long-term, City have a plan which will see them grow and even win the tournament. They want to build a new training academy, to even better Barcelona’s to help the development of young players, although it has recently hit a hitch over planning permission and is years away from completion, but it will eventually be built, and shows City are looking at building sustainable success through their academy. Short-term, the club who name their reserves the ‘Elite Development Squad’ will want better results in 2012/13. A win would be nice.
Watch highlights of City’s 2-1 loss to Barcelona.
image: © Gene Hunt
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