@Carolina Red + @stevoc Sorry for the long delay in responding to your posts, it is just that I have been rather busy of late (what with the World Cup and all). Anyway here are the responses in question...
For example while Real Madrid have got rid of Ronaldo, they can still afford to replace him with either Neymar or Hazard (heck they would likely afford both), which (so long as the formations/tactics are modified to take account of their inclusion) would enable them to maintain the same level of quality and thus continue their dominance of in the CL. Likewise Barcelona have basically managed to sign Iniesta's replacement in the form of Coutinho (which is not a bad like-for-like replacement), hence why I want Man City to sign him up) and are able to afford someone like Salah to replace Messi when the time comes.
So it is is very foolish of other clubs to assume that the decline of the El Classico sides (and without a doubt they are declining) will enable them to start winning CL's once more considering the ability of both clubs to maintain their dominance in the long-term, hence why both "declining" clubs continue to dominate the CL to this day (despite Barcelona bottling it against Roma in the QF 2nd Leg Last Season, which had they not done so would have enabled them to reach the final). Thus the only way anyone can break their monopoly is if they invest massively on transfers (and in turn rob many other major clubs of their best players) to build a squad that can outcompete with them in the Champions League.
That in turn either requires scrapping FFP altogether or at the very least reform FFP to allow for clubs to obtain a unrestricted amount of inflated self-sponsorship from the owners of said club. Which would allow owners to invest into clubs without the possibility of lumbering said clubs with debt that they cannot afford (which should be the main focus of FFP in my view).
Because footballing biases aside, I feel that FFP should be used to stop clubs being lumbered with debt (either to achieve success for other reasons) rather than it being used as a tool to perserve cartels and monopolies in the world of European Club Football. Because for me the issue of the former is far more important (especially for us football fans, no matter what club we support) than disputing about who had a god given right to success/trophies or not.
So to answer your question about "How much I feel City need to spend", well lets firstly take a look at their best possible First and Second XIs:
As you can see when you can look at the First XI, you can see why Man City ended up winning the League by 100 points (and breaking other records in the Premier League) when you look at the quality of that starting XI (even if Mendy hardly played while Kompany missed large parts of the previous few seasons).
However when you look at the Second XI, the amount of quality in that side is considerbally less to say the least, so much so that I ended up having to put Zinchenko (despite being a CM/CAM...even if he has been played as a LB last season) as LW for lack of any other options (hence why we should have got Sanchez last season instead of royally f**king that one up). Which (4) explains a lot why we crashed out of the Champions League in the QF, got kicked out of the FA Cup by Wigan, struggled to maintain the same level of performance in the Premier League during the second half of last season and of course lost 3 times to Liverpool (despite having a utter shock of defence as well as having Henderson as their capitain). Simply because we lacked strength in depth.
So to enable us to have enough players (and quality) to allow us to have 2 World Class XI's within our squad, we need to purchase another GK, another LB, 2 CBs, another RB, another DM, another CM, another LW, another RW and another Striker. In other words 10 new players or more specifically these players:
GK: Allison (Transfermarkt Value: £54 Million) (5)
LB: David Alaba (Transfermarkt Value: £45 Million)
CB: Jan Vertonghen (Transfermarkt Value: £29 Million)
CB: Toby Alderweireld (Transfermarkt Value: £36 Million)
RB: Joshua Kimmich (Transfermarkt Value: £50 Million)
DM: Casemiro (Transfermarkt Value: £54 Million)
CM: Isco (Transfermarkt Value: £68 Million)
LW: Eden Hazard (Transfermarkt Value: £100 Million)
RW: Riyad Mahrez (Transfermarkt Value: £45 Million) (The only one on this list who has actually been signed up)
ST: Harry Kane (Transfermarkt Value: £135 Million)
Now to get all 10 of these players would cost a grand total of (according to the Transfermarkt) of £616 Million, although in reality the cost would be closer to £800-900 million for all 10 of these players (if not more) while the wages required to obtain these players would likely push the overall cost of these 10 players past £1 billion.
It would however mean that Man City would finally a squad which could provide them with 2 World Class XI's, as these post-transfer First and Second XI's show:
Likewise for Man City to obtain enough players (and quality) to have 3 World Class XI's, they would also need obtain the following 10 players as well:
GK: Hugo Lloris (Transfermarkt Value: £23 Million)
LB: Alex Sandro (Transfermarkt Value: £41 Million)
CB: Kalidou Koulibaly (Transfermarkt Value: £54 Million)
CB: Raphaël Varane (Transfermarkt Value: £63 Million)
RB: Kieran Trippier (Transfermarkt Value: £18 Million)
DM: N'Golo Kanté (Transfermarkt Value: £54 Million)
CM: James Rodríguez (Transfermarkt Value: £63 Million)
CM: Thiago (Transfermarkt Value: £54 Million)
LW: Lorenzo Insigne (Transfermarkt Value: £54 Million)
RW: Mo Salah (Transfermarkt Value: £135 Million)
Now to get all 10 of these additional players would cost a grand total of (according to the Transfermarkt) of £559 Million, although again one has to bear in mind that in reality the cost would be closer to £800-900 million for all 10 of these players (if not more) while the wages required to obtain these players would likely push the overall cost of these 10 players past £1 billion.
However if City did decide to spend a grand total of £2 Billion on those 20 players, it would actually give them more than enough players (and quality) to provide the club with 3 World Class XI's:
So long story short, the amount of addtional investment Man City need to invest into their squad is at the very least £1 billion and as a maximum £2 billion. A figure which is course stupidly high, but when you want to build a that wants to completely dominate both Domestic and European football and do so in an age of £100 million Pogba's and £200 million Neymars, the overall cost is going to reach such levels.
Note
(1) Who don't have the benefit of competiting in a domestic league which only 2 sides have a realisic chance of winning. A benefit which makes it eaiser for a team to win both their Domestic League and the Champions League.
(2) Let us not forget that ever since George Weah left for AC Milan (who was practised in the art of financial doping long before PSG or City where), PSG where basically a mid-table side who qualified for the Champions League 3 times in 15 years (and all the while get knocked out in the Group Stage every time) and whose best league performances during the 1997-2011 period were finishing 2nd on 2 occasions. All this in a domestic league which was at best the 5th best one in Europe.
Man City meanwhile where also a mid-table side (who had brief spells in the 2nd and even 3rd tiers of football) in the last 10-15 years before the ADUG takeover and one which qualified for European competition only once (the Europa League in 2003-2004) before the takeover.
Real Madrid in contrast since 1997 has never finished lower than 5th in their domestic league (which is among the strongest of domestic leagues in Europe), won said league 4 times, finished 2nd 3 times, reached the Copa Del Rey finals twice and won the Champions League 3 times in the years before ADUG's takeover of City. All this in a period that was considered disappointing (for a club like Real) by many.
(3) In other words win the domestic league by at least 95-100 points as part of a Quadruple.
(4) When you combine the fact that it is pretty much impossible to win a Quadruple by playing the same First XI across 60+ games, games which they need to play to win all 4 trophies.
(5) Yes I know he has foolishly signed up for Liverpool, but there is nothing stopping City (who should have hijacked the move in the first place) from signing him up in January from Merseyside, which hopefully would be helped by Allison finding out the painful reality of having Lovern right in front of you.
On paper they are indeed seperate football clubs to Man City, even if operations wise it is a different story. However to be fair to the B Team's in La Liga, many did orginate from seperate standalone clubs in their own right before being taken over by their eventual parent clubs.
Like many things about the CFG and its owners, they are indeed being dishonest about this matter. It does not however mean it is a bad idea overall though (in terms of the concept of having "International" B Teams), far from it in fact.
It does when those same fans critcise other clubs like City from having B Teams of their own in La Liga, regardless of their actual legal status. Especially when many of those La Liga clubs B Teams began as legally seperate entities in their own right.
While there might not be players out there who are "equally" as good as Ronaldo and Messi, there are plenty of players who are more than good enough to enable them to maintain their dominance over the Champions League, players whom they are able to afford with the commercial success that both the Messi generation at Barcelona (as well as players like Ronaldinho beforehand) and the Ronaldo generation at Real Madrid (as well as the previous generation of Galacticos) have helped generate for their clubs (with the help of government support of course).
For example while Real Madrid have got rid of Ronaldo, they can still afford to replace him with either Neymar or Hazard (heck they would likely afford both), which (so long as the formations/tactics are modified to take account of their inclusion) would enable them to maintain the same level of quality and thus continue their dominance of in the CL. Likewise Barcelona have basically managed to sign Iniesta's replacement in the form of Coutinho (which is not a bad like-for-like replacement), hence why I want Man City to sign him up) and are able to afford someone like Salah to replace Messi when the time comes.
So it is is very foolish of other clubs to assume that the decline of the El Classico sides (and without a doubt they are declining) will enable them to start winning CL's once more considering the ability of both clubs to maintain their dominance in the long-term, hence why both "declining" clubs continue to dominate the CL to this day (despite Barcelona bottling it against Roma in the QF 2nd Leg Last Season, which had they not done so would have enabled them to reach the final). Thus the only way anyone can break their monopoly is if they invest massively on transfers (and in turn rob many other major clubs of their best players) to build a squad that can outcompete with them in the Champions League.
That in turn either requires scrapping FFP altogether or at the very least reform FFP to allow for clubs to obtain a unrestricted amount of inflated self-sponsorship from the owners of said club. Which would allow owners to invest into clubs without the possibility of lumbering said clubs with debt that they cannot afford (which should be the main focus of FFP in my view).
It stops team's like Man City (1) from building up squads which are able to win the CL while also being able to dominate their domestic competitions. Especially in an age of when the likes of Pogba cost £100 million and the likes of Neymar cost £200 million.
The thing is though, UEFA have shown that there is an "unspoken" limit to how far you can "inflate" sponsorship (despite being no formal criteria as such) within the limits of FFP as their recent actions have shown. Now if UEFA stopped doing this and permitted it under FFP (which would not be a bad thing since it does not encourage owners from lumbering clubs with debt) then I would no longer be against FFP.
Because footballing biases aside, I feel that FFP should be used to stop clubs being lumbered with debt (either to achieve success for other reasons) rather than it being used as a tool to perserve cartels and monopolies in the world of European Club Football. Because for me the issue of the former is far more important (especially for us football fans, no matter what club we support) than disputing about who had a god given right to success/trophies or not.
That is because both PSG and Man City started off from a much lower base than Real Madrid (2) or even Barcelona, the latter of wholm beneftted from a golden generation of players from La Masia which is unlikely to be repeated every again by any other another club academy.
Now as I have stated previously, I feel that for City (and also PSG) to be in any position to win a Quadruple (and dominate their domestic league at the same time) (3) and do so on a regular basis, they need to have a squad which contains enough players (and the quality) to form 2 World Class XIs. Likewise to be in a strong position to achieve those goals on a regular basis I would go as far as suggest they need a squad which contains enough players (and the quality) to form 3 World Class XIs.
So to answer your question about "How much I feel City need to spend", well lets firstly take a look at their best possible First and Second XIs:
First XI
Ederson
Walker - Kompany - Laporte - Mendy
KDB - Fernandinho - D.Silva
Sterling - Aguero - Sane
Second XI
Bravo
Danilo - Stones - Otamendi - Delph
Gündoğan - Toure - Foden
B.Silva - Jesus - Zinchenko
Ederson
Walker - Kompany - Laporte - Mendy
KDB - Fernandinho - D.Silva
Sterling - Aguero - Sane
Second XI
Bravo
Danilo - Stones - Otamendi - Delph
Gündoğan - Toure - Foden
B.Silva - Jesus - Zinchenko
As you can see when you can look at the First XI, you can see why Man City ended up winning the League by 100 points (and breaking other records in the Premier League) when you look at the quality of that starting XI (even if Mendy hardly played while Kompany missed large parts of the previous few seasons).
However when you look at the Second XI, the amount of quality in that side is considerbally less to say the least, so much so that I ended up having to put Zinchenko (despite being a CM/CAM...even if he has been played as a LB last season) as LW for lack of any other options (hence why we should have got Sanchez last season instead of royally f**king that one up). Which (4) explains a lot why we crashed out of the Champions League in the QF, got kicked out of the FA Cup by Wigan, struggled to maintain the same level of performance in the Premier League during the second half of last season and of course lost 3 times to Liverpool (despite having a utter shock of defence as well as having Henderson as their capitain). Simply because we lacked strength in depth.
So to enable us to have enough players (and quality) to allow us to have 2 World Class XI's within our squad, we need to purchase another GK, another LB, 2 CBs, another RB, another DM, another CM, another LW, another RW and another Striker. In other words 10 new players or more specifically these players:
GK: Allison (Transfermarkt Value: £54 Million) (5)
LB: David Alaba (Transfermarkt Value: £45 Million)
CB: Jan Vertonghen (Transfermarkt Value: £29 Million)
CB: Toby Alderweireld (Transfermarkt Value: £36 Million)
RB: Joshua Kimmich (Transfermarkt Value: £50 Million)
DM: Casemiro (Transfermarkt Value: £54 Million)
CM: Isco (Transfermarkt Value: £68 Million)
LW: Eden Hazard (Transfermarkt Value: £100 Million)
RW: Riyad Mahrez (Transfermarkt Value: £45 Million) (The only one on this list who has actually been signed up)
ST: Harry Kane (Transfermarkt Value: £135 Million)
Now to get all 10 of these players would cost a grand total of (according to the Transfermarkt) of £616 Million, although in reality the cost would be closer to £800-900 million for all 10 of these players (if not more) while the wages required to obtain these players would likely push the overall cost of these 10 players past £1 billion.
It would however mean that Man City would finally a squad which could provide them with 2 World Class XI's, as these post-transfer First and Second XI's show:
First XI
Ederson
Kimmich - Alderweireld - Vertonghen - Alaba
KDB - Casemiro - D.Silva
Sterling - Kane - Hazard
Second XI
Allison
Walker - Kompany - Laporte - Mendy
Isco - Fernandinho - B.Silva
Mahrez - Aguero - Sane
Additional Players: Stones (CB); Danilo (RB/LB); Gündoğan (CM); Jesus (ST)
Ederson
Kimmich - Alderweireld - Vertonghen - Alaba
KDB - Casemiro - D.Silva
Sterling - Kane - Hazard
Second XI
Allison
Walker - Kompany - Laporte - Mendy
Isco - Fernandinho - B.Silva
Mahrez - Aguero - Sane
Additional Players: Stones (CB); Danilo (RB/LB); Gündoğan (CM); Jesus (ST)
Likewise for Man City to obtain enough players (and quality) to have 3 World Class XI's, they would also need obtain the following 10 players as well:
GK: Hugo Lloris (Transfermarkt Value: £23 Million)
LB: Alex Sandro (Transfermarkt Value: £41 Million)
CB: Kalidou Koulibaly (Transfermarkt Value: £54 Million)
CB: Raphaël Varane (Transfermarkt Value: £63 Million)
RB: Kieran Trippier (Transfermarkt Value: £18 Million)
DM: N'Golo Kanté (Transfermarkt Value: £54 Million)
CM: James Rodríguez (Transfermarkt Value: £63 Million)
CM: Thiago (Transfermarkt Value: £54 Million)
LW: Lorenzo Insigne (Transfermarkt Value: £54 Million)
RW: Mo Salah (Transfermarkt Value: £135 Million)
Now to get all 10 of these additional players would cost a grand total of (according to the Transfermarkt) of £559 Million, although again one has to bear in mind that in reality the cost would be closer to £800-900 million for all 10 of these players (if not more) while the wages required to obtain these players would likely push the overall cost of these 10 players past £1 billion.
However if City did decide to spend a grand total of £2 Billion on those 20 players, it would actually give them more than enough players (and quality) to provide the club with 3 World Class XI's:
First XI
Ederson
Kimmich - Alderweireld - Vertonghen - Alaba
KDB - Kanté - D.Silva
Salah - Kane - Hazard
Second XI
Allison
Walker - Varane - Koulibaly - Sandro
Thiago - Casemiro - Rodríguez
Sterling - Aguero - Sane
Third XI
Lloris
Trippier - Kompany - Laporte - Mendy
Isco - Fernandinho - B.Silva
Mahrez - Jesus - Insigne
Additional Players: Stones (CB); Danilo (RB/LB); Gündoğan (CM);
Ederson
Kimmich - Alderweireld - Vertonghen - Alaba
KDB - Kanté - D.Silva
Salah - Kane - Hazard
Second XI
Allison
Walker - Varane - Koulibaly - Sandro
Thiago - Casemiro - Rodríguez
Sterling - Aguero - Sane
Third XI
Lloris
Trippier - Kompany - Laporte - Mendy
Isco - Fernandinho - B.Silva
Mahrez - Jesus - Insigne
Additional Players: Stones (CB); Danilo (RB/LB); Gündoğan (CM);
So long story short, the amount of addtional investment Man City need to invest into their squad is at the very least £1 billion and as a maximum £2 billion. A figure which is course stupidly high, but when you want to build a that wants to completely dominate both Domestic and European football and do so in an age of £100 million Pogba's and £200 million Neymars, the overall cost is going to reach such levels.
Note
(1) Who don't have the benefit of competiting in a domestic league which only 2 sides have a realisic chance of winning. A benefit which makes it eaiser for a team to win both their Domestic League and the Champions League.
(2) Let us not forget that ever since George Weah left for AC Milan (who was practised in the art of financial doping long before PSG or City where), PSG where basically a mid-table side who qualified for the Champions League 3 times in 15 years (and all the while get knocked out in the Group Stage every time) and whose best league performances during the 1997-2011 period were finishing 2nd on 2 occasions. All this in a domestic league which was at best the 5th best one in Europe.
Man City meanwhile where also a mid-table side (who had brief spells in the 2nd and even 3rd tiers of football) in the last 10-15 years before the ADUG takeover and one which qualified for European competition only once (the Europa League in 2003-2004) before the takeover.
Real Madrid in contrast since 1997 has never finished lower than 5th in their domestic league (which is among the strongest of domestic leagues in Europe), won said league 4 times, finished 2nd 3 times, reached the Copa Del Rey finals twice and won the Champions League 3 times in the years before ADUG's takeover of City. All this in a period that was considered disappointing (for a club like Real) by many.
(3) In other words win the domestic league by at least 95-100 points as part of a Quadruple.
(4) When you combine the fact that it is pretty much impossible to win a Quadruple by playing the same First XI across 60+ games, games which they need to play to win all 4 trophies.
(5) Yes I know he has foolishly signed up for Liverpool, but there is nothing stopping City (who should have hijacked the move in the first place) from signing him up in January from Merseyside, which hopefully would be helped by Allison finding out the painful reality of having Lovern right in front of you.
