Pep Guardiola’s true vision for Manchester City has never been relayed in public. Not at the lavish ceremony before hundreds of supporters last summer, his proper unveiling weeks later, or countless press conferences since.

                                                                                           Pep Guardiola’s true vision for Manchester City has never been relayed in public. Not at the lavish ceremony before hundreds of supporters last summer, his proper unveiling weeks later, or countless press conferences since.

The suits are worn smarter and smiles wider for Guardiola’s mere presence at City, his appointment seen as a triumph by the hierarchy, but they have remained coy of his intentions. Now, amid one of the largest overhauls in football history, they are unavoidable.

Privately they were laid bare in the months preceding his arrival, however, as Guardiola and sporting director, his old friend from Barcelona Txiki Begiristain, started devising plans for domestic and continental domination. Guardiola had studied the squad in depth, surmising that it dripped with quality but was ultimately too old, and felt he could take them no further. 

He asked Begiristain - the man who signed the vast majority - for a completely new squad. A proper overhaul. Age was an issue and City needed to start again.

The surprisingly defiant answer was no, stars who had achieved so much at the Etihad Stadium must be phased out and not all go at once. Firstly because of the upheaval it would prompt and secondly the financial implications were too great. It also flies against the suggestion by senior club sources in March last year that Guardiola was enthused about the squad he was inheriting from Manuel Pellegrini.