Big-spending Manchester City sit proudly on top of the EPL as they attempt to re-shape their squad for the title challenge, and for the longer-term challenge of abiding by Uefa’s ‘financial fair play’ regulations.

The club have been looking to off-load their more expensive fringe players, with striker Roque Santa Cruz already loaned to previous club Blackburn, Shaun Wright-Phillips and the perennially-disaffected Emanuel Adebayor being touted as potential departures.

Meanwhile, manager Roberto Mancini has called for harder work and “concentration” by his rearguard, which has conceded seven goals in the last three games, despite two wins and a draw in those fixtures.

And City’s Italian supremo revealed this week that he was offered the manager’s role at League Two Notts County last season.

 

City overcame Leicester City 4-2 in this week’s FA Cup third round replay at Eastlands, after a fortunate 2-2 draw at the Championship outfit ten days previously.

Mancini’s men were kick-started by a fine Carlos Tevez goal, just as last Saturday when the Argentine talisman’s wonderful solo effort put previously lacklustre City 2-1 up against a lively Wolves side.

City powered into a 4-1 lead against Wolves before being pulled back to 4-3 and left hanging on in a nervy climax.

Against Leicester, City Tevez missed a penalty before City ran out winners, after being pulled back to 3-2 late on. They now face a fourth round tie at Notts County.

Last year, when Leicester manager Sven Goran-Eriksson was at County, he offered the manager’s role to Mancini, who played under the Swede for many years in Italy’s Serie A.

As Mancini understated this week: “When we spoke, it was a good situation. Afterwards it wasn’t.”

City face a Saturday evening trip to Aston Villa for their next EPL fixture. New £27m striker Edin Dzeko looks set to return to the starting line-up having been ineligible for the FA Cup tie.

Kolo Toure, Nigel de Jong and Gareth Barry, who were all rested on Tuesday night, will also return.

Meanwhile, striker Mario Balotelli is aiming to be back in first-team contention for the Manchester derby at Old Trafford on February 12^th. Balotelli is in the United States undergoing rehabilitation on his injured knee.

Mancini dismissed Balotelli’s recent comments in Italian newspaper Extra Time that United’s Wayne Rooney was no longer even the best striker in Manchester, saying: “He likes to joke sometimes, and these things are jokes.”