Man City player is justifying Pep Guardiola's Cole Palmer transfer decision

Manchester City have a habit of doing their transfer business early in a window.

Pep Guardiola and his recruitment team are admirable for the way they manage to make the right decisions on players in plenty of time so as not to affect the start of the campaign. And yet, uncharacteristically for them, City were still active in August and on deadline day itself.

While us in the media and supporters have learnt not to question Guardiola's decision-making, it was hard not to raise an eyebrow when the news came through about Cole Palmer leaving to join Chelsea. By no means was the young forward a first-team regular but it did appear he was on the same road as Phil Foden at the Etihad Stadium.

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Guardiola chose to keep him around the club to learn instead of sending him out on loan and there were signs at the end of last season and the beginning of this, that he was going to enjoy a more involved role this year. However, this project ended almost overnight.

Fortunately, as is often the case, Guardiola appears to have been one step ahead of us the entire time. When Jeremy Doku arrived a week prior to Palmer's exit, there were plenty of question marks about his potential.

Ultimately, he was an unknown quantity arriving from Rennes after a few good seasons in France having previously been developed at Anderlecht. It seemed a huge risk but City clearly saw something in him and that is coming to fruition right now.

Doku's whopping five goal involvements against AFC Bournemouth this weekend took even his manager by surprise and put his stats at a healthy four goals and six assists in just 14 appearances.