Forever Blue with Ian Cheeseman: Looking forward to the season ahead

As his column about all things Manchester City returns, Tameside Radio presenter Ian Cheeseman reflects on the Community Shield defeat to Leicester and looks ahead to the season - including the tough opening trip to Tottenham.

It’s great to be back for another season and unlike the last one football has it’s soul back, with fans back inside stadiums. I can’t tell you how excited I feel. I’ll never take it for granted again and will try to savour every minute. I was at Wembley over the weekend and even the early start and late arrival home didn’t bother me, I was just happy to be on the road again.

The Community Shield has never been a game where too many judgements should be made and this particular game, against Leicester City, was even less significant than normal. I reckon only three of the starting eleven against the Foxes will be regarded as City’s strongest once things have settled down. I watched Pep’s press conference last Friday and he explained to the media that there were players, like Laporte, who were in isolation which others hadn’t reported back to training after their post-Euro2020 summer break.

Kevin De Bruyne sustained an ankle injury while with Belgium and Phil Foden also missed the Euro2020 final due to injury so the team that played was a mix of youth and experience. I’ve attended many City EDS and youth games so I knew what to expect from Sam Edozie, Cole Palmer and substitute Ben Knight, who’ve all very talented young players, but it would be wrong to judge City’s overall performance against Leicester. Guardiola had announced as much ahead of the game which goes some way to explaining why there were only 45,000 fans in attendance.

City start the new Premier League season at Tottenham Hotspur on Sunday and it will be fascinating to see if Harry Kane lines up against the Blues. Pep confirmed what we already knew that City are interesting in signing the England striker but what will be his mental state given the auction which is being carried out between the two clubs.

The next question is whether City’s new £100 million man Jack Grealish will start. He came on as a substitute at Wembley but if De Bruyne is forced to miss the game maybe Grealish will be on from the start. The England players like Stones, Walker and Sterling might not have had enough training. Guardiola has said, like he did last season, that his squad has not had enough preparation time though he has also admitted that with summer tournaments and preseason tours, it’s never ideal for coaches.

How will Spurs be affected because surely it’s the same for them? As this is my final column ahead of the big Premier League kickoff it seems logical to try to assess City’s prospects of retaining their title, but there are so many variables still to be decided. What major transfer are to come before the end of the month? City could yet have Harry Kane in their ranks or perhaps another attacking player. Who will leave the squad and how will that affect their strength in depth which was such a key factor last season?

I believe Chelsea will be City’s major rivals though I also believe United’s strong end to the season and the strengthening they’ve done will make them serious title contenders again. Liverpool are the hardest to assess, but I can’t see them losing six in a row at Anfield again, like they did when only the TV cameras were allowed in, so they’ve be back in the title race. I don’t expect Spurs or Arsenal to be serious contenders though Leicester and Leeds are worth keeping an eye on.

Sports Talk with me, every Friday night from 7pm on Tameside Radio, will be back in full Premier League mode from this week so there’ll be loads more discussion on this subject. I’m also back doing my City matchday vlog on the Forever Blue Youtube Channel and on this Friday’s Sports Talk you’ll hear from former City player Nedum Onuoha, who was the special guest on the Forever Blue podcast which also returned this week.

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