Manchester City’s £458m Midfield Rebuild Still Leaves Erling Haaland Without Cover

Manchester City have completed a full overhaul of their midfield at a cost of £458m this summer, a new Premier League record for a single window. Yet buried inside that eye-watering figure sits a question City appear to have left unanswered: if Erling Haaland goes down injured, who actually leads their attack?

A midfield rebuilt from scratch

New head coach Enzo Maresca received full backing from director of football Hugo Viana in his first transfer window in charge following Pep Guardiola’s departure, and City’s record transfer fee was broken twice in the space of a few weeks. A joint British record £125m was spent on Maresca’s former Chelsea captain Enzo Fernandez, after £116m had already gone on Elliot Anderson from Nottingham Forest. Morocco international Ayyoub Bouaddi, only 18, arrived for a further £86m, with the trio accounting for the bulk of City’s incomings.

Those signings replace a midfield stripped out almost entirely, with captain Bernardo Silva, 2024 Ballon d’Or winner Rodri, Tijjani Reijnders and Nico Gonzalez all departing. Just four players now remain from the starting eleven and substitutes who beat Inter Milan in Istanbul to win the Champions League. Senior figures at the club are said to be delighted with business done not just across the summer but stretching back to January, when deals for long-term targets Antoine Semenyo and Marc Guehi were accelerated.

City feel their squad is now stronger than at the start of last season, achieved, in their own view, by staying calm and trusting a transfer strategy that dates back to a difficult opening to the 2024-25 campaign. What is less clear is how Maresca intends to fit his new arrivals together, and whether the club has left itself without a back-up centre forward.

The selling side of the ledger

City’s spending will grab the headlines, but the club has also been effective sellers. From the turn of the year they have recouped £334m, including £75m for Savinho, who scored only two Premier League goals in his spell at the Etihad, along with £65m for Rodri and £52m for Reijnders. That leaves a net spend of £208m for 2026, a figure that will be trimmed further once Tottenham’s obligation to sign Omar Marmoush for £60m at the end of his loan is triggered next season.

Sources at the club described a one-out, one-in policy through the window, and Maresca managed to replace almost every departing player, with Gonzalez and Marmoush the exceptions. With the squad well stocked at left back, Nico O’Reilly is expected to play more often in his natural midfield role to cover the Gonzalez gap. City believe the record fee for Fernandez is justified by his experience of winning at the highest level, while Anderson was rated the club’s number one summer target and the teenage Bouaddi is regarded internally as having the attributes to become a truly elite talent.

How Maresca fits his midfield together

Fernandez, Bouaddi and Anderson are all comfortable in more than one midfield position, and Maresca has already switched between a box and a diamond shape in his opening two league games. The difference between the two comes down to structure: the box uses two natural holding midfielders, the diamond only one.

Against Bournemouth, Guehi paired with Anderson at the base of midfield, while O’Reilly played as the left-sided attacking midfielder alongside right back Rico Lewis, who tucked inside to complete the box. Against Crystal Palace, left back Josko Gvardiol and O’Reilly flanked number 10 Rayan Cherki as the three players ahead of Anderson in what looked closer to a diamond. Anderson anchoring the midfield in both matches points to Maresca viewing him as Rodri’s long-term successor, while his praise for Bouaddi has consistently come with a reminder of the teenager’s age, suggesting he is currently pencilled in as Anderson’s deputy rather than his equal.

Bouaddi replaced Anderson against Palace, coming on shortly after Mateo Kovacic, who had looked like Maresca’s first choice holding midfielder in pre-season before sliding down the pecking order. When Kovacic dropped deep to get on the ball, Bouaddi pushed higher to compensate, a fluid rotation City appear comfortable encouraging as their midfielders get to know one another. Fernandez himself operated at the base of midfield and as an attacking midfielder on both flanks under Maresca at Chelsea, and that same versatility is central to how City plan to use him at the Etihad.

The number 10 role has so far been shared between Phil Foden and Cherki. Foden has played on the right wing in both opening matches through injuries elsewhere, but Maresca has spoken about valuing his central quality, and given Foden’s form as a box-to-box midfielder two seasons ago, there is a real possibility he and Cherki eventually play through the middle together.

The end of the Rodri era

No departure this summer carries more symbolic significance than Rodri’s. The Spaniard won the Ballon d’Or in 2024 after a season in which City barely lost a match with him in the side, and his exit closes the chapter on one of the most important individual signings of the Guardiola era at the Etihad. Replacing a player of that profile was never going to be a like for like exercise, and City’s decision to spread the responsibility across Fernandez, Anderson and Bouaddi rather than target a single direct successor reflects how difficult Rodri is to replicate with one name alone.

Anderson’s early role at the base of midfield suggests City see him as the closest thing to a long-term successor in terms of positioning, though his profile as a player differs from Rodri’s. Fernandez brings the winning pedigree and big match experience City wanted, having lifted the World Cup with Argentina and won the Champions League with Chelsea, while Bouaddi is viewed as a long-term project rather than an immediate alternative. Between them, City are betting that a committee can do collectively what one player did alone for the best part of five years, a bet that will only be tested properly once the fixture list toughens beyond Bournemouth and Crystal Palace.

The Haaland problem nobody has solved

For all the positives of the rebuild, Haaland is now City’s only recognised first team striker. He finished last season as the Premier League’s top scorer with 27 goals and has started this campaign with two goals in two games, making him more central to City’s hopes than almost any single player at a rival club.

Omar Marmoush wanted regular first team football and was allowed to leave for Tottenham, while 21 year old Divin Mubama, who impressed in pre-season, joined Championship side Southampton on loan. City believe they have enough flexibility elsewhere in the squad to cover the gap left by Marmoush’s exit without a direct replacement. Semenyo operates mainly from the right but is seen internally as an option through the middle, having featured there in cup matches last season, while deadline day arrival Ndiaye offers further versatility as a proven Premier League performer.

Of City’s forward and attacking midfield options beyond Haaland, only Semenyo has reached double figures for Premier League goals in the last two seasons. Cherki, Jeremy Doku and Ndiaye have never hit that mark, and while Foden showed he is capable with 19 Premier League goals in 2023-24, he has struggled for consistent form in the two seasons that followed. Unless a couple of those players raise their level quickly, City’s summer spending will not have solved the one problem that could define their season: what happens the day Haaland cannot play.

It is a curious position for a club that has just broken its own transfer record twice in a matter of weeks to find itself in. Every other position on the pitch now carries multiple senior options capable of starting a Premier League match without a significant drop in quality. Centre forward, by contrast, carries one. City’s calculation appears to be that Haaland’s durability across his time in England, allied to the goalscoring depth spread across Semenyo, Foden, Cherki, Doku and Ndiaye collectively, is enough cover without needing a recognised understudy in the same mould.

Whether that calculation holds will not become clear until City actually need it to. Maresca’s early season selection puzzles around his revamped midfield are, by comparison, a more manageable problem, one that comes with the luxury of too many good options rather than too few. The Haaland question offers no such luxury, and it is the one part of City’s record breaking summer that still looks unfinished.

Guardiola’s departure and Maresca’s arrival were always going to bring scrutiny of every transfer decision made across the summer, given the scale of the rebuild attempted in a single window. Two wins from two league games have bought Maresca some early goodwill, but City’s fixture list will soon include opponents better equipped to expose any gaps left by the transition, both in personnel and in tactical approach. The Italian’s preference for rotating between a box and a diamond shape already shows a coach willing to adapt his structure match by match rather than commit to one system regardless of opponent, a flexibility that could prove useful if injuries force further reshuffling.

For all the noise generated by the individual fees involved, the more revealing story of City’s summer could end up being the one still unresolved: whether a squad rebuilt so heavily around midfield depth was left short in the one position that has defined the club’s trophy laden recent history.