![\"Tijjani](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/0_GettyImages-2222234735.jpg\")
Tijjani Reijnders has been brought in to improve Manchester City’s midfield<\/p>\nManchester City have strengthened in midfield for the upcoming season but so have two of their biggest rivalsTijjani Reijnders has been brought in to improve Manchester City’s midfield<\/p>\n
Manchester City feel like they are in a much better place than they were when they distanced themselves from Martin Zubimendi. The man who had literally replaced Rodri in the final of the European Championship was declared not to be a Rodri replacement at club level back in December 2024.<\/p>\n
Pep Guardiola’s side were just about to lose to Aston Villa at the time as part of a grim run of form<\/a> that saw them lost 15 out of 30 games across all competitions between November and March with a midfield that puffed and spluttered and too often got outplayed. When moves for Zubimendi and Bruno Guimaraes were ruled out, bewildered Blues hoped that there would be<\/a> something magic up City’s sleeve.<\/p>\n Nico Gonzalez arrived in the final week<\/a> of the January window as City belatedly moved to bring in a midfielder, although he hasn’t seen much action since. Six months on from his signing, the 23-year-old has struggled to assert himself into the team.<\/p>\n Since then, Kevin De Bruyne has also departed and after looking to make Florian Wirtz his replacement City stepped back as Liverpool<\/a> seized the initiative before taking him to Anield for \u00a3100m. Bringing in Tijjani Reijnders for \u00a346.3m looks like excellent business for City, although the Dutch international will not likely be as eye-catching.<\/p>\n Arsenal spending \u00a360m on Zubimendi means that City’s two main rivals have signed midfielders that they were interested in. Add in the \u00a3105m Declan Rice and there is plenty of room for transfer regret.<\/p>\n As usual, the Premier League<\/a> will surely be won and lost in the midfield and City knew that they needed to reinforce theirs when they spent nearly \u00a3100m on Reijnders and Gonzalez. They have not been allowed to go unchallenged though, with Liverpool and Arsenal strengthening as well.<\/p>\n Whatever happens next, all three clubs appear to have locked in their midfields for the coming season following confirmation that Zubimendi has joined Arsenal. The only surprises will be which combination works best.<\/p>\n City have the opportunity to champion their recruitment team if they can come through with the best midfield, trumping the big sums their rivals have spent in midfield by proving that they had the smartest picks in the market. But the stakes are high, and if Liverpool or Arsenal beat the Blues with players that were wanted at the Etihad then nobody will be talking about price tags.<\/p>\n City are used to missing out on players, but they cannot afford to start missing out on more trophies as a result<\/p>\n Kevin de Bruyne – special edition ON SALE NOW<\/p>\n Kevin de Bruyne is one of – if not the – greatest players to play for Manchester City.<\/p>\n He leaves the club having won six Premier League titles, two FA Cups, five League Cups and a memorable Champions League victory!<\/p>\n To mark his amazing time at the Etihad Stadium, this special edition has been produced – KDB The King – to celebrate Kev’s career with the Blues. We look back at his 10 best games in Blue, celebrate his title wins and hear from the City boss and a host of team-mates and football elite who give their views on what makes him so special.<\/p>\n CLICK HERE TO BUY<\/a><\/p>\n —<\/p>\n Here at the Manchester Evening News, we\u2019re dedicated to bringing you the best Manchester City coverage and analysis.<\/p>\n Make sure you don\u2019t miss out on the latest City news by joining our free WhatsApp group. You can get all the breaking news and best analysis sent straight to your phone by clicking here<\/a> to subscribe.<\/p>\n You can also subscribe to our free newsletter service. Click here<\/a> to be sent all the day\u2019s biggest stories.<\/p>\n And finally, if you\u2019d rather listen to our expert analysis then make sure to check out our Talking City podcast. Our shows are available on all podcast platforms, including Spotify<\/a> and Apple Podcasts<\/a>, and you can also watch along on YouTube<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Manchester City have strengthened in midfield for the upcoming season but so have two of their biggest rivalsTijjani…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":242926,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[1036,2398,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-242925","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-manchester-city-fc","9":"tag-manchester-city-transfer-news","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-uk","12":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114806851619325479","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242925","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=242925"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242925\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/242926"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=242925"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=242925"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=242925"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/0_ThekingJPG.jpg\")
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