Why Kaka Won’t Be Going to Man City

By: Daryl | January 14th, 2009

After the Man City mega-billions takeover and the Robinho mega-millions signing on summer deadline day, we were braced for more of the same in January 2009.

Recently it’s all seemed a bit less glamorous than expected, with Mark Hughes going after the useful but not quite so stellar talents of Wayne Bridge (signed) Scott Parker and Craig Bellamy (possibly on the way) instead.

But the madness finally began for real last night, with Man City reported to be making the sort of offer to Kaka and Milan that looks like a numerical typo.

Word from the papers (broadsheets, no less) is that Man City have made a silly money bid of £100m to Milan for Kaka, and are prepared to pay the player (and I quote) “£15m a year net or £500,000 a week gross.” That’s half a million pounds a week, or £26m a year (before taxes).

Goes without saying that both the transfer fee and the wages would be world records.

Clearly, this is more than just paper talk. There’ve all kinds of random rumours and gossip linking Man City with all sorts of players. But it’s mostly been papers (and websites) adding two and two together and coming up with a £50 million move for Fernando Torres/Cristiano Ronaldo etc. Whether City pull this off or not, this at least seems to be an actual bid, with City’s execs heading south to meet with Milan’s execs and talk about some very big numbers.

But I predict we’re about to find out what the limits of money are. Clearly Man City have the wonga to offer unbelievable sums for players like Kaka, and now we know they’re definitely willing to do it. But there are plenty of reasons Kaka won’t be joining City.

First and foremost, Man City still aren’t a very good team. They’re relegation battlers. And Kaka or no, until they sort out the defence (or at least defensive midfield) City will continue to be relegation battlers.

For me, trying to sign Kaka now is going about things backwards. He’s a “jewel in the crown” type player, someone you can only buy after you’ve built a solid squad because he’s not going to want to be a great player in a sub-standard team.

Second, the Brazilian has missed out on Champions League football with Milan this season, and would miss out again next season should he join City. If he’s the committed, competitive individual we think he is, then he won’t be willing to do that for any amount of money.

It’s also worth bearing in mind what effect joining City would have on Kaka’s currently spotless reputation. Right now he’s the golden boy genius footballer/consumate pro who belongs to Jesus and never does anything wrong. A money grabbing transfer would tarnish that halo quite a bit, and someone somewhere is going to photoshop that famous t-shrit to read “I Belong to ~~Jesus~~ Man City”.

Third, when this rumour first broke (back when the Daily Express were suggesting wages of £200k per week) our intrepid Man City blogger j pointed out a very interesting clash of interests stemming from Milan’s relationship with adidas.

So Man City has silly money, and the odds for the final transfer fee have already been calculated.

But the smart money still says he’s going nowhere.