Guardiola looking for ‘one or two’ addition as Man City move away from £300m spends

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The Premier League title winners have invested heavily in recent transfer windows, but their manager is planning minor tweaks in the summer of 2018

Pep Guardiola insists Manchester City will not be spending “£300 million every season”, with the plan to make just “one or two” additions this summer.

Since taking the reins at the Etihad Stadium, the former Barcelona and Bayern Munich boss has received considerable backing in the transfer market.

City have invested heavily in the likes of John Stones, Leroy Sane, Gabriel Jesus, Ederson, Bernardo Silva, Kly Walker, Benjamin Mendy and Aymeric Laporte.

Those additions have helped to restore domestic dominance, on the back of a Premier League and Carabao Cup double in 2017-18, and Guardiola feels his squad now requires mere minor tweaking.

A man who has added LMA and Premier League Manager of the Year awards to his roll of honour told Monday Night Football: “[We will sign] one or two more, no more.

“We cannot invest…maybe people don’t believe me but we don’t have the money to invest £300m every season.

“We invested a lot of money and will invest less in the future, because instead of doing it in two or three transfer windows, we did it in one. We needed it for the age [of the squad].

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“The fundamental success of this season is the quality of the players. People say you won because you invest a lot, they are right.

“Ederson, for example, was perfect, but then at the end you are saying ‘go and try the Premier League and try to play’ and you don’t know if it’s going to happen.”

One of the positions that Guardiola will be looking to strengthen is in the middle of the park, with Yaya Toure preparing to leave City after eight trophy-laden years.

The Catalan coach is, however, playing his recruitment cards close to his chest when it comes to possible targets.

Pressed on where he intends to add, Guardiola said: “Maybe in front, but I don’t know.

“We have to think and talk more with Txiki [Begiristain] and the staff. It’s four competitions, we need new faces to compete with the guys from this season.”

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