Tony Cascarino was quizzed about one of Manchester City’s sales during the summer of 2023.
Since the summer of 2022, it seems like City have been especially confident about selling some of their big-name players.
The exits of names like Raheem Sterling, Oleksandr Zinchenko and Gabriel Jesus were widely viewed as risky — considering the arrivals of Erling Haaland, Julian Alvarez, Kalvin Phillips, Stefan Ortega and Manuel Akanji were not viewed as direct replacements for the departing trio.
However, Pep Guardiola’s men did not seemingly bat an eyelid and went on to win a historic treble in the same season.
In December last year, Gary Neville claimed that Manchester City’s replacements were not as good as the exiting trio of Riyad Mahrez, Ilkay Gundogan and Aymeric Laporte — while Cole Palmer was running riot at Chelsea.
Tony Cascarino gives his honest verdict on Man City selling Cole Palmer
But once again, Manchester City made a mockery of such claims by winning their fourth league title in a row, despite perhaps even missing the likes of Mahrez, Gundogan, Laporte and Palmer at different points of the season.
In fairness, as brilliant a prospect as Palmer has always been, he surpassed expectations in emphatic fashion by registering 22 goals and 11 assists for Chelsea in the Premier League.
A £42.5 million fee (BBC Sport) might have been considered stunning business from City but the Englishman is likely to be worth double that figure after his first season at Stamford Bridge.
Tony Cascarino felt Manchester City let Palmer leave a bit too early, perhaps due to Kevin De Bruyne’s presence at the club.
On talkSPORT, the pundit said: “Well, Kevin De Bruyne is a big carrier of the ball, the one that makes everything happen. He has been so successful for Man City and has been an absolute superstar for them. And I just think the timing was wrong. It’s just too quick. I think they felt that De Bruyne had two or three years still in there, and he might well have. And I think it fell badly for him.”
Man City will be hoping Savinho is their answer to selling Cole Palmer
Regardless of whether one agrees or disagrees with Tony Cascarino, Manchester City will be hoping that in new signing Savinho, they have an answer to their decision to sell Palmer last summer.
It would be unfair to expect the Brazilian to accumulate 33 goal contributions during his debut campaign at City — especially when playing his first season of Premier League football.
But the Sky Blues will be hoping that the 20-year-old proves to be a prodigy in the same vein as Palmer and eventually develops into one of the best wingers in the league.
Wingers tend to struggle during their first seasons under Pep Guardiola and even if that is the case, Manchester City should be able to see enough from Savinho in terms of his potential and mentality that he can turn into a player of a similar calibre to the Chelsea poster-boy.
If the former ESTAC Troyes technician manages to do so, their decision to sell Palmer will no longer be viewed as a potential error in judgement by many.
