Manchester City boss won’t pay over the odds

Manager Mark Hughes has again warned that Manchester City will not pay over the odds for players in the January transfer window.

The City boss has already revealed his intention to add up to six players to his under-performing squad as he looks to invest the large pot of money expected to be provided by club owners the Abu Dhabi United Group.

But despite the club's new-found wealth, Hughes has vowed to remain prudent as he looks to build a squad capable of challenging for domestic and European honours.

"We're aware of this assumption about the level of finance that we'll throw at the project in January, but we still have realistic market" he told the club's official website.

"There is also an assumption that we will stimulate the market, that the money sloshing around will be from the deals that we have started, but we have to make sure we protect the club as well."

"We're hoping to go into the market and acquire players that we think will help us, but it is still dependent on whether clubs are willing to deal with us or not."

"The deals that we do will have to be good ones, but we are quite happy at the moment.

"We know that there will be a premium that we will probably have to pay because it's January, and teams don't want to lose their better players. But it will not be to the extent where we are paying hugely over the market value.

"There is a budget out there and we will work within that. The key thing is to make sure the quality we bring in supplements the quality we already have here.

"I feel that the addition of the right players will give us more consistency in the second half of the season."

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