First to a very familiar name in our gossip column this summer, Alexis Sanchez, who features heavily again across the Sunday papers and pixels.
The Mirror’s Steve Bates reports: “Manchester City are ready to offer a staggering £70 million to snatch Alexis Sanchez before the transfer window slams shut.
“Pep Guardiola and his Etihad bosses will pursue Arsenal star Sanchez right until the 11pm deadline on August 31 in the hope the Gunners will sell their Chilean attacker.
Over in the Sun, City are being linked with a move for a Turkish starlet.
Mike McGrath reports: “Arsenal and Tottenham have joined Manchester City in the race for Turkish whizkid Oguz Kagan Guctekin.
“The 18-year-old midfielder has been promoted to the Fenerbahce first-team set up and sparked interest in the Premier League.”
Finally skipper Vincent Kompany has spoken of his admiration of Guardiola’s managerial qualities.
Joe Bernstein writes in the Daily Mail: “It is Pep Guardiola’s ability to see things unfolding on the pitch ahead of everyone else that marks him out as a special manager, according to his Manchester City captain Vincent Kompany.
“Kompany was signed by Mark Hughes and won trophies under Roberto Mancini and Manuel Pellegrini.
“But he can see why Guardiola will be viewed as a managerial great by future generations, having enjoyed success at Barcelona and Bayern Munich before being hired to change the footballing philosophy at the Etihad” writes Bernstein.
“‘It’s very clear to me that his No 1 quality, which is not one you can learn or teach, is that he sees the technical and tactical aspect of a game really fast,’ said Kompany.
“‘There are times in a game when you are trying to figure out what is going on, especially with players you don’t know, and he has this thing where he can break down a game pretty quickly and transmit the message to solve the issue.
“‘It’s not about genius in that case, it’s about having the skill to put across the message across in a way the team understands it.
“‘I think that’s why his previous teams have been successful and of course it gets even better with experience. Having a clear delivery in a way people can buy into it.’”
We’ll be back with more City-related paper-talk tomorrow…
