Fabian Delph - Signed for Manchester City

[Vegas]

Yeah I saw this too ... Hopefully just tawdry speculation.  We don't need this ...

[dekko]

Chill out, he's going nowhere

[Matt Collins]

Think citeh will be going for mega signings so can't see this happening.

[Dave]

Think citeh will be going for mega signings so can't see this happening.

They need to sign homegrown players

'All 20 Clubs must include eight Homegrown players out of a squad of 25 for that Premier League season,' read the Premier League's own rulebook. 'A Home Grown player will be defined as one who, irrespective of his nationality or age, has been registered with any club affiliated to the Football Association or the Football Association of Wales for a period, continuous or not, of three entire seasons or 36 months prior to his 21st birthday (or the end of the season during which he turns 21).'

They are official words to send shivers through Manchester City's hierarchy. Let's run through City's eight homegrown players from last season: Dedryck Boyata (left), Gael Clichy, John Guidetti (left), Joe Hart, Frank Lampard (left), James Milner (left), Scott Sinclair (left) and Richard Wright. And then there were three (and one of them was Richard Wright).

So between their academy and transfer dealings they need to come up with five homegrown players for their first-team squad next season. I can't think how they are going to make both "mega signings" and come up with the homegrown players that they need to have.

[silhillvilla]

Man city sniffing.....release clause??

Let's hope the figure is high enough to put them off

[warleyboy]

Delphi is going nowhere for the next couple of seasons at least.
He is playing regular football, has the armband and is a settled England player.
If he has another great season for us, I would bump his wages to keep him happy.

[Phil from the upper holte]

Delphi is going nowhere for the next couple of seasons at least.
He is playing regular football, has the armband and is a settled England player.
If he has another great season for us, I would bump his wages to keep him happy.

On the basis that he's just signed a new 4 year deal, I see that being unlikely

[SoccerHQ]

Think citeh will be going for mega signings so can't see this happening.

They need to sign homegrown players

'All 20 Clubs must include eight Homegrown players out of a squad of 25 for that Premier League season,' read the Premier League's own rulebook. 'A Home Grown player will be defined as one who, irrespective of his nationality or age, has been registered with any club affiliated to the Football Association or the Football Association of Wales for a period, continuous or not, of three entire seasons or 36 months prior to his 21st birthday (or the end of the season during which he turns 21).'

They are official words to send shivers through Manchester City's hierarchy. Let's run through City's eight homegrown players from last season: Dedryck Boyata (left), Gael Clichy, John Guidetti (left), Joe Hart, Frank Lampard (left), James Milner (left), Scott Sinclair (left) and Richard Wright. And then there were three (and one of them was Richard Wright).

So between their academy and transfer dealings they need to come up with five homegrown players for their first-team squad next season. I can't think how they are going to make both "mega signings" and come up with the homegrown players that they need to have.

What punishment will they get if they don't meet that criteria? Squad reduced to 15 or something amusing.

I do think only being allowed to register 20 players in the CL last season hurt them a bit.

[Dave]

I don't think it's the sort of thing that there would be a punishment for.

If they can't get eight players that meet the criteria then they would just be submitting a squad of 20, 21 or 22 players.

Which as you say is going to hurt them anyway.

[OCD]

Delphi is going nowhere for the next couple of seasons at least.
He is playing regular football, has the armband and is a settled England player.
If he has another great season for us, I would bump his wages to keep him happy.

You don't need to give a player a pay rise everytime he does well. I imagine he would be happy to see us signing quality players and feeling that we're progressing upwardly.

[villadelph]

If he goes to City he can kiss the England squad goodbye.

[exigo]

It's not just the fact that he's just signed a contract, it's his message about loyalty at the time he signed. File under improbable.

[warleyboy]

Delphi is going nowhere for the next couple of seasons at least.
He is playing regular football, has the armband and is a settled England player.
If he has another great season for us, I would bump his wages to keep him happy.

You don't need to give a player a pay rise everytime he does well. I imagine he would be happy to see us signing quality players and feeling that we're progressing upwardly.

That really depends, put yourself in Delphs position.
He has showed his loyalty, new 4 year contract when plenty of teams would have taken him.

Let's say he is on 60,000 a week, Micah comes in on the same or more, Tekkers is given more to stay, we grab Austin and offer him 65,000....
All I'm saying is, the captain of the team who mostly always puts a shift in, shows loyalty, deserves to be a top earner and out of everybody, should be given incentives to stay at villa park.

Whereas you have Tekkers who seems to be looking for a way out to bigger and better things, which I can understand.
But if no one is to buy Him, he may take another contract with us on even more money to keep him happy at VP for another season.

I just feel incentives should also be for loyal players who commit rather than look at us as a stepping stone.

[Matt Collins]

I can take benteke leaving. But not Delph (or grealish)

[Lastfootstamper]

Delphi is going nowhere for the next couple of seasons at least.
He is playing regular football, has the armband and is a settled England player.
If he has another great season for us, I would bump his wages to keep him happy.

You don't need to give a player a pay rise everytime he does well. I imagine he would be happy to see us signing quality players and feeling that we're progressing upwardly.

That really depends, put yourself in Delphs position.
He has showed his loyalty, new 4 year contract when plenty of teams would have taken him.

Let's say he is on 60,000 a week, Micah comes in on the same or more, Tekkers is given more to stay, we grab Austin and offer him 65,000....
All I'm saying is, the captain of the team who mostly always puts a shift in, shows loyalty, deserves to be a top earner and out of everybody, should be given incentives to stay at villa park.

Whereas you have Tekkers who seems to be looking for a way out to bigger and better things, which I can understand.
But if no one is to buy Him, he may take another contract with us on even more money to keep him happy at VP for another season.

I just feel incentives should also be for loyal players who commit rather than look at us as a stepping stone.

I understand where you're coming from, but do you have one fact to back any of these numbers up?