Maresca takes City helm as £116m Anderson bid looms

Enzo Maresca has officially taken charge of Manchester City, tasked with replacing Pep Guardiola as the club closes in on a £116m deal for Nottingham Forest midfielder Elliot Anderson. The appointment comes as City prepare for a significant midfield restructuring, with 2024 Ballon d’Or winner Rodri offering mixed messages about his future before his 2027 contract expires.

Guardiola departs after a decade in which he delivered 20 trophies, establishing City as a dominant commercial and sporting force in European football. Maresca, who served as his assistant during the 2022-23 treble-winning season, must now prove his own managerial credentials. His recent successes include winning the 2025 Conference League and Club World Cup with Chelsea, and guiding Leicester back to the Premier League in 2024.

The impending arrival of Anderson for a staggering £116m underscores the financial stakes of this transition. The 23-year-old, a key figure for Thomas Tuchel’s England at the World Cup, represents a major capital deployment aimed at replacing Rodri. The Spain international is still recovering from a serious knee injury suffered in September 2024. “I’m very calm, I know exactly where I stand, and I’ll tell you that perhaps if there hadn’t been a World Cup, things might be different now,” Rodri said, signalling that a sale could benefit both the player and the club's balance sheet.

Maintaining City’s competitive edge is a commercial imperative for the parent company. The team finished seven points behind Arsenal last season, losing the title after a 1-1 draw at Bournemouth. For Maresca, bridging that gap is essential to avoid becoming the club’s equivalent of David Moyes—the successor who failed to sustain a lucrative dynasty.

The club’s operating model has long relied on Guardiola’s tactical supremacy, a structure built meticulously by chief executive Ferran Soriano and former sporting director Txiki Begiristain. Begiristain departed last summer and was replaced by Hugo Viana as the evolution away from a Guardiola-centric model began. Chairman Khaldoon al-Mubarak’s doctrine dictates that no manager is bigger than the club, but the hierarchy must now demonstrate they can apply this principle by backing Maresca if early results dip.

A key part of his brief will be reducing the team’s operational reliance on striker Erling Haaland. Two seasons ago, Haaland scored only 22 Premier League goals, trailing Mohamed Salah, resulting in City’s only trophyless campaign since his arrival. Maresca must diversify the squad's scoring options to ensure the club's revenue streams and sporting prestige remain insulated from a single player's form.