Roberto Mancini says Manchester City must spend big this summer to become title challengers

Roberto Mancini, Manchester City

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Manchester City must look to strengthen significantly this summer in order to become genuine Premier League contenders next term, according to manager Roberto Mancini.

The Italian masterminded City’s first trophy win for 35 years with victory over Stoke City in the FA Cup final at Wembley on Saturday, and his side have already earned Champions League football next season by virtue of a top four finish in the league.

This kind of success has not come cheaply, however, with City’s owners Abu Dhabi United Group having splashed out over £400 million on player signings since taking over the club in the summer of 2008.

Mancini believes more investment will be necessary to bring top domestic and European honours to Eastlands, and has revealed he voiced this opinion in a recent meeting with the club’s chairman, Khaldoon Al-Mubarak.

“We spoke only about the money,’’ Mancini told reporters of his meeting. “If you have not won anything for a long time and you don’t buy good players you can’t win. It is impossible.

“You can have the best manager in the world, a magician on the bench, but if you don’t buy then all the clubs who have bought good players are going to win.

“The Premier League is a very difficult League. There isn’t only Manchester United, Chelsea and Arsenal. There is Tottenham. These are strong teams but now we have time in the summer when we can buy other players.”

Mancini feels a lack of squad depth put paid to his side’s title hopes this time around, and believes winning the league will become even more difficult with the added distraction of the Champions League next year.

“This year we should take Tottenham as an example,” he added. “Tottenham played in the Champions League until the quarter-final and in the Premier League they are sixth.

“It is difficult if you don’t have a big squad so that you can change six or seven players for every game.”

But despite the challenges that lie ahead, Mancini remains confident that City are on course to achieve their objectives, and he believes their FA Cup success will give the players the belief to go on and achieve greater things.

“City started this project two years ago,” the former Inter boss said. “I believe in this project because we have a big chance to buy the sort of players United and Chelsea have bought in the past.

“I don’t know if we can win the title next year because this is difficult, but we can arrive at this target in one or two years if we work well. It is important for a club like City to start to win trophies.

“It is difficult in the first year to arrive at the championship win the league unless you go to United, Chelsea, Real Madrid or Barcelona.

“If you take another team you need to work. It is tough to win a league. Maybe next year we can play compete for the top with United.

“This victory the FA Cup will help me and the players and the club to improve. We have a good team because we have a young team. We bought Balotelli, Dzeko, Boateng. Only one player is older. Yaya is 28. All these players can improve.

“With time, we can be an important team for a long time.”