Full Description
On 12 May 2019, Manchester City became the first team to
retain the Premier League title for a decade.
Twenty years earlier, the same club was slogging its way
fortuitously out of Division Two, having sunk ignominiously to the third tier,
its glory days well behind it.
Ordinarily, the tale of a sleeping giant awaking to stomp
gleefully over the competition would be celebrated far beyond the core fanbase.
But City's success is tied inextricably to its takeover by the Abu Dhabi United
Group in September 2008, an event that altered the club's horizons beyond any
plausible recognition. The injection of billions of pounds into the club and
accusations that Abu Dhabi is 'sports washing' its reputation have tarnished
City's domestic treble-winning season in 2022-23, as have serious charges of
financial impropriety from the Premier League.
Glory Days for the
Waifs and the Strays charts this route from noble rags to uncomfortable
riches and unpacks what it means when a team's lowest lows and highest highs
occur improbably within a generation.
It amounts to a story like no other in modern football. The
distance travelled from there to here, the iconic human moments along the way,
the greats on either side of the white line and the uniquely divisive means by
which it's been achieved. Manchester City have defined an era in English
football. This is the tale of how that happened and why it matters.
