ROQUE SANTA CRUZ OFF TO CITY
Mark Hughes aims to tie up £15million deal this week
HAMMERS CHASE DANIEL STURRIDGE
Teenage hitman is on the way out of Manchester City
- Manchester City in £10million bonus | Mark Hughes and players will share mega jackpot for top six finish
- Win Wembley Cup tickets | Your chance to see Spurs, Barcelona and Celtic
- GARETH BARRY LEADS ON
- MICAH RICHARDS IN KOP FRAME
- CITY MUST DUMP ROBINHO
- GARETH BARRY'S WRITE ON
- SAMUEL ETO'O AMAZING WAGE DEMAND
ROQUE SANTA CRUZ hopes to wrap up his £15million move to Manchester City this week - if he passes his medical.
The Blackburn striker has a long and alarming history of knee problems, going back to his Bundesliga days with Bayern Munich.
Santa Cruz, 27, spent the end of last season getting himself fit for a move away from Ewood Park, after missing out on a move to City in January.
The Paraguay international has not played since the beginning of March and will be subjected to a strict medical examination by the Eastlands backroom staff.
The injuries suffered by Santa Cruz have meant he was allowed to leave for less than the £18m Rovers were demanding just after Christmas.
He watched from the stands as Sam Allardyce's side secured Premier League safety with two weeks to spare and it is believed the club regretted not selling him.
Tottenham boss Harry Redknapp had hoped to take the striker to White Hart Lane, after learning City had their minds on other targets.
Spurs were told they may even be lucky enough to get their man on the cheap, because there were no other serious bids for the injury-prone frontman.
But their chances of signing Santa Cruz vanished when City boss Mark Hughes, who brought Santa Cruz to Blackburn two years ago, declared his continued interest last week.
Hughes has been looking to sign a target man around whom to build his team since taking over from Sven Goran Eriksson exactly a year ago.
City made two bids for the forward in January but refused to meet the Blackburn board's hefty valuation at that time.
Please note: All comments are moderated.
Tick this box to accept our
TERMS & CONDITIONS
This article has 13 comments
What is so special about Santa Cruz which is tempting Hughes to go for him.Even Sam Allardyce shows regret for not selling him earlier.I'll prefer he concentrate on Tevez or Aguerro.These guys can rip apart any defence.
By ME Annan.. Posted June 19 2009 at 9:41 PM.
Mark. Please strengthen the defence as number 1 priority.Dunne is sadly a disaster.It seems everyone can see this apart from you.
By Jim Whitney.. Posted June 14 2009 at 10:21 PM.
Manchester United is a powerful sophisticated football club.Christiano Ronalda will never be better than Man United. Players go and players arrives while Man United sails along like a criuse liner.
By wesley yearwood.. Posted June 14 2009 at 4:44 PM.
A fully fit and fully comitted Santa Cruz would be good enough to grace any Prem League side. With a good supply of crosses and an injury free run he will bag goals for fun, an ideal target man and a snip at 15 million looking at todays ridiculous inflated market!
By ChesterRover.. Posted June 14 2009 at 4:30 PM.
I do think that for all the money that Man City do have, they can do a lot better than signing average players in the Premiership such as Santa-Cruz. However, they do not have champions league football, which plays a major factor in getting the players. But santa-cruz isn't the answer
By Chris Sedgley.. Posted June 14 2009 at 3:14 PM.
if city are the richest team in the world then why not go for big name players instead of BLACKBUN PLAYERS!!!!!!!!!!!!
By billy nixon.. Posted June 14 2009 at 3:19 PM.
with the system that hughes plays,you have to be a very special center forward of the highest calibre to play up front alone ,with most of the team afraid to cross the half way line. boring manager, boring tactics.
By william white.. Posted June 14 2009 at 2:58 PM.
When Sven joined we decided not to but him from Bayern for £3m as we went for Bianchi and Bojinov instead and Santa Cruz had injury history.
He is not worth anymore than £7m to be fair, but neither was Craig Bellamy who also cost £14m!
Football has gone crazy!
By JohnG.. Posted June 14 2009 at 12:45 PM.
Have cruz with pleasure he has no backbone to fight the cause. When the chips are down so will he be.
By Ian... blackburn .. Posted June 14 2009 at 11:18 AM.
You're off the mark, Mr Bluesky. Mark Hughes' hands have been tied for a year now, and still are. City are still bad news as far as the general media and fans go. The elite wont join any club that isn't a member of the elite. That's been made clear to us for months now. Villa was always going to join Real Madrid, Aguero is 'elite'. Eto'o wants €1 million a month, but is waiting to see whether any of the elite will pay those wages. If they won't, he's then got the option of City. Hughes is waiting, and carrying on collecting, which is all he can do.
By roy harper.. Posted June 14 2009 at 1:12 AM.
really don't think this guy is the answer, for sure his dodgy knee won't just suddenly get better, we need to take a look at the bellamy situation and make sure it doesnt happen again. Just splash the cash and get eto'o CTID
By bluemoon00.. Posted June 13 2009 at 11:52 PM.
the lad can play when fit. We should have been able to do better than this though.
By kel.. Posted June 14 2009 at 12:02 AM.
With talk of Eto'o, David Villa and my No 1 Aguero it is really disappointing to see MH still wants to persist with Cruz... Perhaps he'll regret it one day ?
By Mr bluesky.. Posted June 13 2009 at 10:52 PM.