Barcelona prove two Man City decisions correct amid Frenkie de Jong saga

Despite lazy perceptions about the unlimited money that Manchester City operate with, the club have clear red lines that often lead them to walk away from transfers. This can be related to transfer fees - such as when they would only go to £70m for Harry Maguire in 2019 when Leicester had their own immovable demand of £80m - but cover all aspects of a transfer.

This was the case with Ajax star Frenkie de Jong in 2019. City weren't put off by the £65m price tag on the midfielder that was lighting up the Champions League, but his wages were an issue: paying him more than the excess of £300,000-a-week in wages that was asked for would have blasted their existed wage structure out of the window (Kevin De Bruyne was their highest-paid on £250,000 at the time) and meant they would have had to improve terms for other players as a consequence.

It made for an unhappy Pep Guardiola, the manager giving a rare public critique of the club's transfer policy by asking for them to act more quickly in future to secure the targets they wanted. Barcelona had no issue with the terms and enhanced their reputation as one of the biggest clubs in the world by signing him.

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However, the last three years have proven far better for City than for Barcelona. Guardiola will never know how his team would have looked with De Jong in, but there are now no arguments around the signing of Rodri that summer - for a similar fee but far lower wages - and the Blues have just won back-to-back league titles for the second time in recent years. Barcelona's deal for De Jong, in contrast, stands as one of the many financially irresponsible deals done that have left them in