Pep Guardiola has said he wants the older players of his squad to remain at Manchester City next season despite the influx of younger talent in the January transfer window.
After a torrid first half to the season, City spent £180m ($223m) last month to replenish their squad with the signings of Omar Marmoush (26), Vitor Reis (19) Abdukodir Khusanov (20) and Nicolás González (23).
Guardiola appears set to usher in a new era at the club built around younger talent, as was evidenced in their recent Premier League game against Liverpool. City’s lineup at the Etihad on Sunday was the joint-youngest the Spaniard has fielded in a Premier League match.
The new direction the club is moving in has put the futures of its older players — Bernardo Silva, John Stones, Éderson and Ilkay Gündogan — in doubt. Kyle Walker left the club in January to join AC Milan on loan and Kevin De Bruyne is out of contract in the summer.
However, Guardiola insisted that this older brigade, who have been central to City’s success over the past decade, still have roles to play at the club.
“There are players here that their age is over 30 but they are part of the future of this club. Except Kevin, and Kevin and the club will decide on his future everyone who has a contract for next season I expect him to be here,” he told a news conference on Friday.
“They are going to help us. Next season will be a lot of games. We cannot do it just with our new ones. They will be able to help and be part of our season.”
Meanwhile, LaLiga president Javier Tebas revealed on Thursday that he reported City to the European Commission for financial mismanagement in 2023.
The probe is the latest in a slew of investigations the club have faced in recent years. They are presently fighting a case against the Premier League for allegedly breaking over 100 league rules and have previously warded off UEFA’s attempts to ban them from the Champions League for inflating their sponsorship revenues.
When asked why City is such a target for people, Guardiola said: “I don’t know. It happened in the past with Uefa and in a few weeks it’ll happen in the Premier League, the sentence, right? We wait, and after we talk.”
The FA Cup presents City’s only chance of winning silverware this season and the club face Plymouth in the 5th round on Saturday.
Despite their Championship status Guardiola isn’t underestimating the side who have knocked out Brentford and Premier League leaders Liverpool in the previous rounds.
“They are solid and, of course, since the manager took over the results are there. They only lost a few games in their last 10 or 11 so yes, I expect a difficult game,” he said.
“We play at home — that is a little advantage compared with away. But these types of games we know they are tricky because these types of teams, what they do, they do really well.”