City make Neymar move as Rodwell at pains to stop growing

Manchester City have made an initial move to sign Neymar from Santos after Ferran Soriano, the City chief executive, and the club’s director of football, Txiki Begiristain, met his family and representatives during Brazil’s friendly with England at Wembley on February 6th.

Executives from IMG, the global sports agency, and IMX Talent, which look after the 21-year-old’s marketing opportunities, were present. The striker is likely to cost City upwards of €40 million.

Meanwhile, Vincent Kompany is set to return for Sunday’s league visit of Chelsea. The captain has been out with a calf injury since January 26th, since when the club have not won a league game and have dropped seven points.

City have been cautious with Kompany’s recovery as it was the third calf problem he has suffered in less than a year. But he has taken a full part in training this week and Roberto Mancini is keen to select him to face Rafael Benitez’s side if the central defender suffers no setback.

‘A good player’

Jack Rodwell, who played the last half-hour in Sunday’s 4-0 win over Leeds United in the FA Cup fifth round, uses Kompany as a model for his career. “Vinny is a good player, and I look to him, watch his game and would definitely take the same path as him. He started out in midfield and is now one of the best centre-halves in the world,” the 21-year-old said.

A series of hamstring injuries have disrupted the start of his City career since joining from Everton in the summer but Rodwell is now determined to stay fit for the long term. “That has been my main problem for the last year or so, an inability to stay fit and shrug off little injuries.

“That has held me back, and I think if I can stay fit, the games will come,” he said. “I have stuck to a six or seven-week programme where I have not had a day off. I have hammered the work, done a lot of hamstring work and luckily, touch wood, it has worked. I intend to keep that up for the rest of my career.

“I come in early every day, have a load of treatment and then for half an hour before training I work on my own. Then after training, if necessary, I stay for some more strength work, so all in all I probably do an extra hour and a half. I do yoga two or three times a week, depending on how my body is feeling. It may be down to the way I was growing, as I was only 20 to 21, and hopefully I have finished growing.”

Guardian Service