Manchester City: A New Era Under Enzo Maresca
After a decade of Pep Guardiola’s iron grip on English football, the Etihad suddenly feels like unfamiliar territory. The trophies, the control, the aura – all his. Now the keys belong to Enzo Maresca, one of Guardiola’s former lieutenants, and the question hangs over Manchester City: what does this team look like without its architect?
Guardiola walked away in May with a domestic double, beating Arsenal in the League Cup final and then Maresca’s old club Chelsea in the FA Cup. Those wins pushed his haul at City to an absurd 20 trophies: six Premier League titles, three FA Cups, five League Cups and the Champions League. That is the bar. Maresca steps into a job where anything less than near-perfection feels like underachievement.
And he has to do it while the dressing room is being quietly rebuilt.
A New Era, With Big Departures
This isn’t just a change in the dugout. It’s a reset on the pitch too.
John Stones and Bernardo Silva, two pillars of the Guardiola era, have gone. Stones to Inter, Silva to Real Madrid, both on free transfers. Rodri, the metronome at the heart of everything City did, has joined Barcelona. That’s the spine of a dynasty stripped out in one summer.
City have not stood still. Elliot Anderson has arrived from Nottingham Forest for serious money after impressing both in the Premier League and at the World Cup. They are still being heavily linked with Enzo Fernández and Ayyoub Bouaddi as they look to rewire a midfield that has lost its anchor.
But the context matters. City have gone two full seasons without a league title, pipped first by Liverpool and then by Arsenal. At this club, that’s a drought. The Maresca era started with a jolt too – a 3-0 defeat to Mikel Arteta’s Arsenal in the Community Shield, a reminder that the champions have moved on and the margin for error has shrunk.
This is not a gentle handover. It’s a high-wire act.
Haaland: The Inevitable Focal Point
One thing, though, feels utterly predictable.
Barring injury or a collapse in form almost unprecedented in Premier League history, Erling Haaland will again be City’s top scorer. The Norwegian comes into the season off an excellent World Cup and has hit at least 22 league goals in each of his four Premier League campaigns, including 27 last time out.
Under Guardiola, everything in the final third was bent towards Haaland finishing moves. Maresca’s Chelsea side last season saw Cole Palmer explode, but Nicolas Jackson’s wastefulness repeatedly blunted them. Haaland is not that type of forward. Give him the volume of chances Jackson squandered, and the numbers will take care of themselves.
Whatever changes around him, City’s season in front of goal still runs through the No 9.
The Quiet Rise at the Back
Trying to pick a “breakout” player at City this year almost feels like forcing the issue. This is a squad stacked with established internationals, serial winners and ready-made starters.
Anderson, despite being new, already arrives as a proven performer after his Forest spell and World Cup displays. Jeremy Monga, the 17-year-old signed from Leicester, is clearly one for the long-term project rather than the here and now.
That leaves Abdukodir Khusanov as the most intriguing candidate. The centre-back began to emerge in the second half of last season, but this could be the campaign where he truly nails down a place when everyone is fit. In a defence that has lost Stones’ calm and versatility, Khusanov has a chance to step out of the shadows and claim that vacancy as his own.
If City are to absorb the shock of those exits without losing defensive stability, his development becomes more than just a subplot.
Foden’s Line in the Sand
If there is one player standing at a crossroads, it is Phil Foden.
Nobody seriously questions his talent. The issue is what comes next. Last season drifted by for him. He became a bit-part figure for long stretches, starting and stopping, never quite seizing the campaign. Seven goals in 33 Premier League appearances is modest by his standards and nowhere near his potential influence.
The price was heavy. He missed out on the World Cup squad and watched from home as others took the stage that once seemed destined to be his.
Now, he has a renewed Manchester City contract, a full preseason behind him and a manager who needs game-changers to step forward. This is a season that can redefine his trajectory. If Foden catches fire again, City gain a match-winner who can tilt tight games on his own. If he doesn’t, the sense of a career slightly out of sync will only grow louder.
What Counts as Success?
At almost any other club in Europe, a season of transition under a new manager, after losing your captain and key midfielder, might come with tempered expectations.
Not here.
At Manchester City, not winning the Premier League is failure. That was true before Guardiola, it certainly was during his reign, and it will not soften now he has gone. The benchmark remains the same: finish top in May, or the season is judged harshly.
Maresca knows exactly what he has walked into. He also knows Arsenal have finally broken their 22-year wait for a league title and will no longer carry the psychological weight of near-misses. Liverpool remain dangerous. The league is unforgiving.
Yet City still possess a squad built to compete for every trophy available. Supporters will not measure this campaign in progress or promise. They will look up at that trophy in May and ask one thing: is it back at the Etihad?
The Maresca Question
For years, City lived with the certainty that Guardiola would find the answers. Tactically, emotionally, week after week, he solved problems before they fully formed. That sense of security has gone.
Maresca arrives with silverware on his CV from Chelsea’s Club World Cup and Conference League triumphs, but his league record was patchier, his teams less ruthless over 38 games. He is not at Guardiola’s level yet. Nobody is pretending otherwise.
He does, though, now command a squad far superior to anything he has worked with before. The tools are elite. The concern is whether he can assemble them with the same precision, the same relentlessness, that defined the last decade. At City, “good” is not enough. The standard is “historic”.
Verdict
Prediction: second.
If Maresca hits the ground running, if Haaland stays fit and Foden reignites, City have the power to haul Arsenal back down. But asking a first-year manager at the Etihad to instantly replicate Guardiola’s machine is a monumental demand.
The season will reveal whether this is a brief pause before City reclaim their crown, or the first sign that English football’s most dominant era is finally starting to fray.
