Oh Rodney, Rodney!

One of my regular ways of catching up from afar is to listen, on Wednesday or Thursday, to the BBC podcast of the Radio Manchester evening show Blue Tuesday. This week, the station's City magazine programme featured former City star Rodney Marsh, who has a new book out. I thought I'd focus on one of the original seventies mavericks, a flamboyant and controversial figure whose talents lit up Maine Road between March 1972 and October 1975.

Accounts and financial fair play: more already!

Little did I know when I highlighted this issue last week and promised to return to it quickly that it would be quite this quickly! I commended the piece by the football finance blogger Swiss Ramble on City's finances, and did him the courtesy of letting him know I'd quoted his conclusion. He responded with a gracious note letting me know that he was putting the finishing touches to something I'd probably be very interested in. It duly appeared, and I was. So will you be if you're interested in this kind of subject.

Past Newcastle games - and two famous City sons of the NE

So, City scraped a win against Newcastle this afternoon, a below par display overcoming the spirited Geordies in large part due to the generosity of referee Martin Atkinson. On a day on which the decisive strike came from Sunderland-born Adam Johnson, I look back 30 years or more to two matches against today's opponents each also memorable for the contribution of a Blue from the north east. We actually have a history of big games against the fine old opponents that are the Magpies going back to the 1924 FA Cup semi final, and taking in the 1955 FA Cup final and the 1968 championship clincher. Those all pre-date me, though, and as ever I've chosen to remember the mid and late seventies.

Moscow support dilemma

Away from the world of Manchester City, I face, in five weeks or so, the prospect of moving to a new job. Or at least, having taken up the new job in the St Petersburg office of the law firm in which I'm now employed, I'll move to the head office Moscow. I've led a fairly itinerant life, in fact, but wherever I've been I've always tried to get into the local football. Moscow offers plenty of choice in this regard, so I'm currently reflecting on which team to adopt.

Report - terms agreed for revised CoMS lease

In a previous posting, I mentioned that an official council document had referred to renegotiation of City's lease for the City of Manchester Stadium. More quickly than anyone supposed, a Manchester Evening News exclusive on Saturday claimed that the deal has now been done. Has it? And if the MEN is right, what's the reasoning behind City dicthing the current revenue-based approach, agreeing to pay an index-linked flat rate set at a higher level than the Council would now receive from sell out crowds?

City losses and the Financial Fair Play Regulations - the issues to be answered

Manchester City this week unveiled financial figures showing a £121 million loss for the financial year 2009/10. This is, or at least should be, no surprise to anyone given the investment we know Sheikh Mansour to have made in the club in the two years since his takeover became official. The question facing the club is how this squares with the need to comply with UEFA's so called fair play rules. I haven't had time properly to absorb those rules yet, and so this is something I'll return to in due course to try to analyse it properly. For the time being, though, let's simply look at what the issues are.

Recognition for this blog!

I've taken few, if any, steps to publicise this blog. I post links on my Twitter feed, and mentioned it on the Bluemoon message board in a thread that had disappeared from the main page within a very short space of time, but that's about it. So I was suprised, but pleased, to see it referred to in positive terms by Manchester Confidential.

Potential Disney tie-up: if true, what does it mean?

So the start of October has arrived. This was the point at which I originally suggested we may see an announcement concerning Sportcity, but there's no sign yet of this coming to pass. There are now whispers (and from sources whose word has been proved reliable on other things in the past) that we may now hear something substantive in November. As we've now been waiting a year from the date when it was originally thought an announcement would be made, it will be frustrating if the timetable slips further, but, desperate as I am to know what's going on, I can see why the Abu Dhabi policy is to announce something when it's ready and not before. So for the time being, we continue to be reduced to looking at current events to see if there are any signs of what may be to come. One recent item of interest came in a recent national newspaper report, which trailed a likely deal between City and what we can legitimately refer to as a world media giant.