It's not really that Manchester City have been quiet in the ongoing summer transfer window but Pep Guardiola is not yet done with revamping his squad.

Of course, now that Lionel Messi is no longer a realistic target for the time being, seeing how the Argentine has confirmed he'll be staying at Barcelona for the remainder of the upcoming campaign, the Citizens can once more focus on other priorities.

Speaking of priorities, despite adding Nathan Ake from Bournemouth to the squad, Man City still want to reinforce their defence. For quite a long time, Napoli's Kalidou Koulibaly has been their prime target but the Citizens have also tried snatching up Atletico Madrid's Jose Gimenez as well.

However, according to the latest reports from La Gazzetta dello Sport reporter Alfredo Pedulla, Diego Simeone has rejected Guardiola's £62m for the defender as they are not exactly willing to part ways with their star.

Not to mention that Gimenez is also the third captain behind Koke and Jan Oblak so getting this deal over the line could indeed be easier said than done for Man City.

The defender has three years left on his contract and a release clause worth around £109m. Even for the Citizens, that would be an insane amount of money to spend on one player, especially given the current circumstances.

Gimenez could potentially be a good Koulibaly alternative but at this point in time, it seems that Atletico Madrid could be tough negotiators as well.

Verdict

For quite some time now, it seemed like Man City would complete the Koulibaly transfer sooner rather than later but this Gimenez update did come as a surprise.

Still, seeing how expensive the centre-back could be, maybe it wouldn't be such a bad idea to instead focus on Napoli and give them the money they ask for their star player.