Man City are reportedly ‘close to an agreement’ with Borussia Dortmund to sign their defender Manuel Akanji for around €17.5m.
City have had a very busy summer with Erling Haaland and Kalvin Phillips being their marquee signings. Julian Alvarez, Sergio Gomez and Stefan Ortega have also joined the club.
To the surprise of some, Man City have received more than they have spent in player sales this summer with Raheem Sterling, Gabriel Jesus and Oleksandr Zinchenko being their big-profile departees.
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The Premier League champions have now been tempted back into the market with Aymeric Laporte and Nathan Ake currently injured.
This leaves Ruben Dias and John Stones as City’s only fit senior centre-backs. City have conceded five goals in their last two league games and Guardiola wants his team to “be better” defensively:
“It is completely the opposite, as far away from your goal you are you are much safer,” Guardiola told reporters on Tuesday afternoon.
“We have proved this in six years as part of winning the Premier League we have conceded few goals playing this way. We are going to adjust something, it is normal in this period.
“We are scoring a lot of goals as well and at the same time we are conceding a lot and if we don’t stop that it will be difficult. You can’t always score four or five goals to win a game for a few months. We have to be better.”
Speaking on Man City doing more business before the transfer deadline, he added: “With Bernardo [Silva], I have said many times how important he is for us.
“Just one or two days until the transfer window is shut and everyone will be focused on what they have to do. I don’t know what is going to happen.”
The arrival of Akanji could help them in that sense. The Switzerland international is out of contract next summer and he has fallen down the pecking order at Dortmund.
Summer signings Niklas Sule and Nico Schlotterbeck are favoured over Akanji, so the German side are looking to cash in before he departs for free next summer.
David Ornstein of The Athletic is reporting that talks are ‘ongoing’ between Man City and Dortmund and there is ‘optimism’ that a deal will be finalised.
An agreement is said to be ‘close’ with Man City set to pay €17.5m to add to their defensive ranks.
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