As Manchester City close in on title, Greg Dyke admits concern over Manuel Pellegrini's 'depressing' first team

 
First choice: Joe Hart would be the only English starter in a fully-fit City squad
Getty
Andy Hodgson11 May 2014

The lack of English players in Manchester City's regular starting line-up is "pretty depressing" for the domestic game, according to Football Association chairman Greg Dyke.

The Blues went into Sunday's final day of the Barclays Premier League season knowing a draw at home to West Ham would almost certainly be enough to secure their second league title in three seasons.

But Dyke, who this week presented a series of proposals put forward by his FA Commission set up to improve the long-term fortunes of the national team, is disappointed that City's success this season has featured so few Englishmen, with only goalkeeper Joe Hart a genuine contender to start when Blues boss Manuel Pellegrini has all his first-choice players available.

"It's been a great league this year. But, if there is only one England player, maybe two (in City's team), that's pretty depressing," Dyke told several national newspapers.

"I think the figures that we produced showed the top four averaged 29 (English players between them) and this year it is down to 24 - we should be worried about that."

Best quotes from the 2013/14 Premier League season

1/23

James Milner, who like Hart is expected to be in the England World Cup squad to be named by Roy Hodgson on Monday, has made 30 league appearances this term but 18 of them have been as a substitute.

Midfielder Gareth Barry has spent the season on loan at Everton from City, while Joleon Lescott and Jack Rodwell have barely had a look-in at all.

Dyke reserved special praise for City's title challengers Liverpool, for whom Steven Gerrard, Daniel Sturridge, Raheem Sterling and Jordan Henderson have all been key performers.

"Liverpool have been exciting this year with four or five English players. It's good news for Roy and it's good news for the campaign in Brazil," Dyke added.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in

MORE ABOUT