NOVEL NEXT Chapter 281: Major Reshuffle in Manchester City's Frontline! Tang Long Rises Unexpectedly, Whose Cake Did He Disturb?
Manchester City is a team rife with factions.
In fact, every top professional league club has various factions within.
But compared to other Premier League teams, Manchester City's situation is more complex!
Unlike Chelsea, which also rose with financial backing, Chelsea could already play in the Champions League before Abu took over.
About a decade ago, Manchester City was just a mid-to-lower league team, struggling every year to avoid relegation.
As a Premier League powerhouse that rose in a short time with the help of petroleum capital, the team gathered numerous top players from all over the world, much like Emperor Tang Taizong's ambition of "all heroes under heaven in my grasp."
Because of this, Manchester City's locker room gathered players of different nationalities, races, and cultural backgrounds, disrupting the team's previously stable ecosystem in a short time.
The new players banded together according to their spoken languages, forming the Spanish Language Gang, French Language Gang, English Language Gang, Portuguese Language Gang, and Italian Language Gang.
These factions have a notable characteristic of communicating with each other in their familiar languages rather than using the commonly spoken English in the Premier League.
Tang Long, Ranocchia, and Klarov, the only three players in the team who previously played in Serie A, also formed the Italian Language Gang.
The three of them communicated with each other in the locker room not in English but in Italian.
According to the law of conservation of energy, the cake is only so big. Tang Long's outstanding performance on the forward line undoubtedly took away someone else's share, compressing their survival space within Manchester City!
Currently, Manchester City has only three official forwards: Agüero, Bony, and Iheanacho.
The ranking of these three also represents their strength order on Manchester City's front line, as well as the coach's selection choices.
Agüero, Manchester City's absolute forward ace, last season's Premier League Golden Boot with 26 league goals, and the top contributor to the team winning their first Premier League title in history in 2012 by killing off Queens Park Rangers in the final round!
Whether inside the club or in the hearts of Manchester City fans, this petite Argentine forward holds a supreme position.
No one can shake Agüero's position at Manchester City!
As long as he's not injured, as long as he wants to play, he can always start.
So, no matter how well Tang Long plays behind the forward line, Agüero needn't worry in the slightest that his position will be affected.
Then there's Bony and Iheanacho.
Iheanacho, like Tang Long, was born in 1996, a month younger than Tang Long.
Last season he was still playing in the youth team, and this season he was promoted to the first team as a Premier League rookie.
For this local English youngster, he hasn't held too much hope for himself.
Getting a few substitute appearances, scoring a goal or two, would mean he's not losing out for the season.
So, Tang Long's excellent performance on the forward line won't affect Iheanacho's position.
The key lies with Bony!
He is the most affected person and the teammate most afraid of Tang Long excelling on the forward line.
The Côte d'Ivoire player Bony, born in 1988, is about to turn 27 this year.
In the winter window of January 2015, he was poached by Manchester City from Swansea for a high price of 32 million euros.
Bony's performance at Swansea was still decent, serving as an absolute main player nearly full-time for one and a half seasons.
Playing in 70 matches, he contributed 35 goals and 9 assists, averaging 0.5 goals per game, which places him among the first-rank forwards in the Premier League.
Ages 25 to 29 are very important in a forward's career.
Often by going through this age, a forward matures from youth into mid-career players.
Maturity also means success!
Using Swansea as a springboard to come to Manchester City, Bony had high ambitions, and even once thought of contending with Agüero for Manchester City's starting forward position.
When he realized he couldn't compete, Bony didn't lose heart.
Because last season, besides playing the 4231 single forward tactic, Manchester City also often switched to a 442 double-forward formation.
Bony thought, if he couldn't compete with Agüero for the single forward, surely there should be a place for him in the double forward!
Manchester City spent over 30 million euros to bring me in, even if they're rich, that's not a small price. They wouldn't pay such a high price just to make me a substitute.
Even when Bony's performance was poor in the second half of last season, Pellegrini, after discussions with the management and the first-team coaching staff, still kept Bony on the team.
This was valuing his potential and sympathizing with Manchester City's expenditure of more than 30 million euros.
The coaching team expected Bony to rebound and bring his scoring efficiency from Swansea to the Blue Moon.
Especially after Dzeko left, Bony had undoubtedly become the second choice forward after Agüero.
But things didn't go as planned!
Even with high ambitions, Bony's whole match performance of sleepwalking in the fifth league game against Southampton extinguished the burning flame of his confidence in one cold splash of water.
Bony was in panic!
(Premier League round 5, home to Southampton. Bony, who wasted several of Tang Long's through balls, sighed in despair!)
But after the game, he kept comforting himself: "It's common for a forward not to score goals. As long as I keep working hard and adjust my condition, I will carve out my own space at Manchester City! Believe in yourself, you're the best, Bony!"