If you thought the two week international break would be devoid of news and talking points, well you'd be wrong. Since the new was broken on Friday, all anyone has been talking about is Manchester City, with the Premier League confirming on Tuesday that they had been found "guilty of all charges" having "artificially inflated" their revenues by "more than £900 million" over a decade-long period.
Thus, most right-minded people can surely all agree that every single trophy Man City have won since 2009 must be null and void, and they simply cannot continue to operate as a Premier League entity. So, what impact did this cheating have on Aston Villa looking back?
In recent times, the Villans have been hamstrung by the same financial rules Man City have shown a complete disregard for. Earlier on in this period, many of the Claret and Blue Army's key figures have swapped Villa Park for East Manchester. So, we look back at the quartet to have done just that.
1) Jack Grealish
The most prominent player to make this move is undeniably Jack Grealish. Having been a vital figure as Villa gained promotion from the EFL Championship, as well as recording 18 goal contributions during the 2019/20 Premier League season, he was sold to Manchester City for a then Premier League record £100 million.
He never hit those heights again, with Pep Guardiola coaching the individuality out of Grealish's game, the most prominent skill that made him great in the first place. The fact it is two years since he played for England, currently on loan for a second successive season at Everton, is a sign of his decline.
2) Fabian Delph
Of the four players on this list, the one who would surely receive the least warm welcome back to Villa Park would be Fabian Delph. Having signed a new contract in January 2015, the midfield was a star man as the Villans reached the FA Cup Final, scoring the semi-final winner against Liverpool.
That summer, he was scheduled to have a medical at Manchester City, but did not show up, confirming in a video message that he had "decided to stay" at Villa. Well, a week later, he changed his mind and moved to Manchester, and it turned out that the contract he had signed contained a release clause, so he never intended to remain in the Midlands either-way.
3) Gareth Barry
We are rewinding back to the very start of the Abu Dhabi era at Manchester City, when their industrial scale cheating began. In the summer of 2009, the Sky Blues spent over £108 million on new recruits, including Gareth Barry, joining from Aston Villa for £12 million.
The defensive midfielder had appeared 440 times in claret and blue, but left the club he had joined as a teenager in search of greater wealth and silverware, which did come his way, albeit is now worthless.
4) James Milner
A year later, James Milner followed suit, leaving Aston Villa for Man City for a reported fee of £18 million. The Englishman retired earlier this year as the player with the most appearances in Premier League history, 658 to be exact, overtaking Barry's record, but Villa is not the club most associate him with is it?
Around this period, Martin O'Neill's team were knocking on the door of the Champions League, finishing sixth in three successive seasons. However, the sales of Barry, Milner and other key players such as Ashley Young and Brad Friedel, ultimately signalled their decline. Had Man City not come on the scene at this exact moment, Villa's 2010s trajectory could have looked very different.
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