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Manchester City have been blessed with many legends down the years
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Two of their greatest ever talents were goalkeepers who changed English football
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Their finest player is the undisputed King of the Kippax
Manchester City have been blessed with some exceptional talent down the years, with four different successful eras producing a pantheon of legends.
Honourable mentions must go to Eric Brook, Mike Summerbee and Alan Oakes, but here are the ten greatest ever players to adorn the famous sky blue.
10) Francis Lee
Barrel-chested and squat with an uncle’s face even in his twenties, Lee conjures up the kind of comic-book hero from yesteryear who would be called ‘Thunderboots’ or ‘Hotshot’.
He was an all-action mix of skill and tenacity who primarily played as a forward but liked to drop deep to begin attacks. In this regard he was decades ahead of his time.
A widely revered 33.3% of the Holy Triny of Lee, Bell and Summerbee who propelled City to greatness in the Sixties, Lee would be loved today by those who indulge in football betting online due to his unerring ability to win spot-kicks.
It even gained him a popular nickname, the rather un-PC by today’s standards, ‘Lee Won Pen’.
9) Yaya Toure
When newly-minted City paid Barcelona £24m for Toure’s services in 2010 the misconception was that they had signed a defensive midfielder. In fact, the Ivorian was one of the best box-to-box talents of the modern age.
With the ball at his feet, it was an exhilarating sight, seeing his towering frame bulldoze through defences, while opponents bounced off him almost comically. His habit of scoring goals in big games meanwhile was priceless for the Blues.
Toure helped bring several titles and cups to the Etihad but it was his incredible 2013/14 season that comes most readily to mind. From August to May that year he was simply unplayable.
8) Vincent Kompany
A totemic leader who demanded and cajoled success from his team-mates, Kompany arrived a week before the club’s takeover and became the extravagant project’s heart and soul.
Without the Belgian, it would be logical to knock a couple of trophies off City’s honours roll, maybe more.
Though a magnificent and cultured defender in his own right, it is principally his captaining of the Cityzens to four league titles that earned him a statue, situated outside the Etihad, and – like Toure – Kompany also possessed a handy trait of scoring crucial goals at crucial times.
Two-hundred-and-fifty-plus defensive masterclasses would have been infinitely more were it not for a cruel succession of injuries.
7) Sergio Aguero
Sometimes sports betting is surprisingly straightforward and that was largely the case when Manchester City played competitive football between 2011 and 2021.
The strategy during that decade was simple: firstly, ensure that Sergio Aguero wasn’t injured or suspended, then back the Argentine to score.
Which he did with startling regularity. No other player in the club’s long and illustrious history has ever scored more goals, 260 all told by the time he gave defenders a well-deserved break.
No other striker has notched more Premier League hat-tricks while, firmly illustrating his rare calibre, he boasts the best minutes-per-goal ratio in the Premier League.
This was a player who defined himself by goals, as clinical as they come.
6) Peter Doherty
Not to be confused with the raffish singer though both were libertines in their own way.
Prior to the outbreak of the Second World War, the Northern Irishman forever redefined the inside-left position, not by doing anything remarkably different to his predecessors; simply by executing the role better and with oodles of style.
Indeed, there remains a legion of older Manchester City fans who insist Doherty was the superior of Colin Bell and David Silva, the all-time best of the best, but alas scant footage of his football unfairly counts against him here.
5) Billy Meredith
Meredith made his final appearance for City aged 49 years and 245 days old, retiring as football’s first bona fide superstar.
He then hung up his boots partly disgraced, partly forgiven, and never less than an extraordinary figure who changed the blueprint of the sport forever.
The ‘Wizard of Dribble’ was a household name in 1905 when an opponent alleged that he had been offered ten pounds by Meredith to throw a forthcoming FA Cup fixture.
Though it was one player’s word against the other, the forward was subsequently banned for 18 months.
In due course, the Welshman returned to City but not before winning two titles with arch-rivals Manchester United. Our Premier League predictions suggest it will be a while yet before the Reds add to their historic haul.
4) Frank Swift
A former employee of Blackpool Gas Works, Swift revolutionised goalkeeping in the Thirties, using his enormous hands to throw the ball out to team-mates rather than launching it into the great unknown. Pep Guardiola would have loved the gentlemanly giant for sure.
Aged 21 and playing in a FA Cup final against Portsmouth in front of 93,000, the stopper affectionately nicknamed ‘Frying Pan Hands’ due to his colossal finger span of 30cm, fainted on his goal-line at the final whistle, requiring smelling salts to come around.
“Fancy a strapping lad like me fainting in front of all those people and the king,” he later said. On the following Monday, King George V sent a telegram enquiring about his well-being.
Swift made 376 appearances for City and captained England on numerous occasions. He tragically perished in the Munich Air Disaster, covering United in a journalistic capacity.
3) Bert Trautmann
Trautmann’s incredible life story has been well-told in books and film yet revisiting it again still prompts utter amazement.
Refusing an offer of repatriation following the cessation of the Second World War this German paratrooper, who was captured by British forces and held as a prisoner-of-war, turned out for St Helens each Saturday afternoon, astounding all who saw him with his outstanding ability.
Manchester City came calling, his signing causing nationwide protest but over time – via patience and a sustained series of brilliant and brave displays - a soldier in possession of an Iron Cross arguably did more to help heal Anglo-German relations post-war than any other individual.
Famously, Trautmann broke his neck during the 1956 FA Cup final, playing on to the end and even attending that evening’s post-match banquet.
2) David Silva
When the magical midfielder nicknamed ‘Merlin’ began his Premier League odyssey it was thought he would be too wispish a talent to thrive in an English centre-circle.
These days, it is hard to imagine any top-flight team not inhabiting their midfield half-spaces with an out-and-out ball-playing schemer. A Silva type.
His bewitching skills, supernatural vision, and unerring balance of a Subbuteo figurine made him a firm favourite of the neutral while for City his contributions were both aesthetically beautiful and substantial, orchestrating numerous title wins and domestic cup honours.
The latest Premier League odds have City down as the likeliest to secure the 2021/22 crown. Had Silva not returned to Spain two years ago those odds would be even slimmer.
1) Colin Bell
The undisputed king of the Kippax, Bell was a complete footballer in every sense, imbued with unnatural stamina that had him nicknamed ‘Nijinsky’ after the racehorse, and a poise that saw him compared to the Polish ballet dancer of the same name.
A shining light of City’s luminous Sixties collective, who won the league and European honours, this otherwise shy and introverted individual spoke so eloquently on the pitch, making 394 appearances for City and scoring 117 goals.
Only three other City players have notched more, each of them forwards. Whereas Bell was a midfielder if very much a complete one.
