Manchester City’s academy has produced some important first-team players for Pep Guardiola’s side over the past few seasons. Perhaps their best academy graduate has been Phil Foden, who has played exactly 300 games for the club, scoring 97 goals and grabbing 57 assists in that time.
More recent academy graduates include Rico Lewis and Oscar Bobb. The pair broke into the City first team at a similar time, and have 81 appearances and 27 appearances for the club respectively. Sadly for Bobb, injuries have affected his career so far, or that could have been far more.
However, City do not manage to keep all their talented academy graduates and have made the mistake of selling a few over the last few years. Two of the most notable sales made by director of football Txiki Begiristain have been Cole Palmer and Morgan Rogers.
Txiki Begiristain’s biggest transfer blunders at Man City
What a huge error City made in selling their former academy attackers before they had a chance to establish themselves in the first team. Palmer joined Chelsea for a fee of £42.5m on deadline day of the 2023 summer transfer window, which proved to be a big mistake from the Citizens.
He has since gone on to become an utterly destructive attacking player. In 72 appearances so far for the Blues, the England international has found the back of the net 39 times and registered 21 assists. As the stats show, Palmer has been one of the deadliest players in the Premier League.
As for Rogers, he left the Etihad Stadium before he could even make his debut for the club. He joined Middlesbrough for £1.5m in 2023, before switching to Aston Villa for £15m just months later, which has been a bargain.
The 22-year-old has so far made 49 appearances for Unai Emery’s side, scoring 14 goals and grabbing seven assists. That includes a Champions League hat-trick in matchday eight against Celtic at Villa Park, an incredible achievement.
City surely must wish they had given Palmer and Rogers a platform to flourish because they could have had two incredibly dangerous attacking stars in their squad if so.
However, possibly the biggest mistake over the last year or so was to sell a striker whose value has shot up since leaving.
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The amazing striker Man City should have kept
Perhaps the worst error that Begiristain has made in the market in recent years when it comes to outgoings is to sell Liam Delap. The Man City academy graduate joined Ipswich Town over the summer for £20m.
In short, he has been sensational for the Tractor Boys this season. Although Keiran McKenna’s side are threatened with relegation, sitting 19th in the table with 16 points to their name, that does not mean Delap has struggled for form in front of goal.
The 22-year-old striker has scored nine goals and has two assists in 23 Premier League games this season. That includes a goal and an assist in winning causes against Tottenham Hotspur in North London and Chelsea at Portman Road.
The England U21 international has been impressing plenty of people with his performances this term. Former midfielder turned pundit Danny Murphy thinks he is “the obvious long-term successor” to Harry Kane once the Bayern Munich legend steps away from international duty.
“I have seen him quite a lot this season and I would probably go as far as to say he is the obvious long-term successor to Kane. I think he is the best young English striker out there. I know he has got a lot to learn and wisdom comes with experience and game time in this league, but he has got all the attributes to be a top international player.” – Danny Murphy.
Indeed, the “lethal” striker, as football analyst H described him, has fantastic statistics this season, via FBref, given how poor Ipswich have been. For example, he averages 0.18 goals per shot and a shot on target percentage of 48.7%.
|
Delap stats in 2024/25 PL |
|
|---|---|
|
Stat (per 90) |
Number |
|
Goals |
0.46 |
|
Shots on target % |
48.7% |
|
Goals per shot |
0.18 |
|
Expected goals |
0.37 xG |
|
Shot-creating actions |
2.4 |
|
Goal-creating actions |
0.31 |
|
Stats from FBref |
|
It might be unsurprising to hear that the 22-year-old is incredibly highly valued by Ipswich. As per reports over the winter, the striker is now valued at £50m, a huge increase of 150% on what he was sold for by City just months ago.
Given his performances and inflated value, the Citizens surely regret selling the striker when they did. Had they given him a chance in the first team, he might have become a prominent player and even pushed for a spot alongside or instead of Erling Haaland.
Selling Delap was another mistake from Begiristain, which is certainly a common occurrence if the form of their former academy stars are anything to go by. City will be desperate not to repeat the error in the future.
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