If Harry Redknapp was in charge of Manchester City now then we would be seeing him whinge in the press about being down to the bare bones and without even the option of signing Nico Kranjcar in an impossible position.

Saints fans were pleased to hear that Pep Guardiola has injury problems for Manchester City's trip, but when we take a closer look at the remaining members of City's squad who are likely to pass muster and make the trip to Southampton, we must sympathise with Pep Guardiola and prepare ourselves for City contacting the Premier League requesting a postponement.

A look at the football website Transfermarkt sees the City squad valued at a little over £1 billion, Ill say it again One Billion pounds ! That's 10 x £100 million for those of us who haven't a calculator to hand.

So the news that Oleksandr Zinchenko and Eric Garcia are likely to miss the trip South due to injury is a blow in that both are valued at £18 million apiece and although not amongst the highest valued players in the City squad, their £36 million joint valuation will mean that Guardiola will only have around £975 million worth of talent to select from.

This puts the Spaniard in an impossible position, as an exponent of the "handed everything on a plate" style of management, he surely cannot be expected to work with a squad that is down to the bare bones, Harry Redkapp would certainly not be willing to put up with this situation.

However Pep didn't get to the top by managing the biggest club's in the Spanish, German and now English leagues on money alone, (Ok he did but lets not be too harsh) and he is expected to adapt rejuggle his team.

A Manchester City insider said:

"This won't phase Pep he has had the situation before at Barcelona, he can get results with a starting line up worth as low at £700 million, he has shown that before and will do so now, he will rejuggle and although it will be tough to only have around £300 million on the subs bench, he has the experience to do it"

In contrast the Saints squad on transfermarkt is valued at around £220 million, although I think that James Ward Prowse and Danny Ings are drastically undervalued at £23 & £18 million respectively, so the true squad value could be nearer £250 million.

If Guardiola loses at St Mary's for a second successive season, then he could find himself well adrift of Liverpool in the title race and for that matter even Saints and rumours will surface of a change of manager at the Etihad.

In expectation of this the following statement was issued by Harry Redknapp this morning.

" Manchester City triffic club, Pep's doing great there, he is a top top guy, don't even ask me about the job, well as you haven't I would love to help them out if Pep was to go, Bondy is available, Ive spoken to Kranjcar and Crouchy, they have retired but can still do a job and if I can spend £500 million in January i'll get them clear from the drop and then we can look at next season.

"But as I said Pep's still in the job and I don't talk about job's whilst the manager is still there, not even when it's clear that a change is needed and i'm available , Pep, triffic guy great manager , he'll get them out of trouble he has some top top players there, but if he doesn't then they know where I am, as I phoned them yesterday to make sure they had the new address."

Photo: Action Images

underweststand added 11:37 - Dec 18 That's really bad news for Pep - isn't it Nick. Poor fella may have a problem trying to field a fit side for under a £billion , so perhaps Ralph ought to have the lads take it easy on City.... and maybe gift them a point for Christmas - as we did so kindly for Arsenal. After all we are ONLY Southampton and perhaps we shouldn't get delusions of grandeur whilst we are sitting up in 3rd place amongst all those "big clubs" . So let's be sportsmanlike and give them a helping hand in their efforts to overtake us in the Prem. table ...(sic) ....before they go back to " conquering Europe".

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