Right. Let me get this straight. Manchester City, a club that has spent roughly the GDP of a small European nation building a squad, are now telling their best midfielder he's free to leave if he fancies it. Pep Guardiola actually stood there and said City won't stand in Rodri's way if he wants to join Real Madrid.

In my day, if your best player even glanced at another club's badge, the gaffer would nail his boots to the dressing room floor. You didn't entertain it. You didn't give a polite little speech about respecting his wishes. You told him to get back on that training pitch and stop being soft.

But here we are. Pep, the greatest tactical mind of his generation allegedly, is essentially putting Rodri on a silver platter and wheeling him over to the Bernabéu himself. Would you like a garnish with that, Florentino? Perhaps a side of Kevin De Bruyne while we're at it?

That's the problem with modern football. Loyalty is a foreign concept. Rodri won the Ballon d'Or as a City player. He was the heartbeat of everything good they did. The bloke literally held the midfield together like duct tape on a leaking pipe. And now Pep's standing there saying "yeah, off you go mate, no hard feelings."

What kind of message does that send to the rest of the squad? Imagine being one of City's younger players. You've fought through the ranks, you've believed in the project, and now the manager is telling the world he won't fight to keep his best player. That's not man management. That's a white flag with a Nike logo on it.

And the bit about Liam Rosenior. Pep actually said he won't follow Rosenior's example. I had to read that three times. Pep Guardiola is now referencing Liam Rosenior in press conferences. I don't know what timeline we're living in but I want off it immediately.

Don't get me started on Real Madrid's end of this. They're like vultures circling a wounded animal. They did it with Bellingham. They did it with Mbappé. And now they're doing it with Rodri. Their transfer strategy is basically "wait for the best player in the world to fancy a move and then answer the phone." It's not even clever. It's just inevitable. Like death, taxes, and Florentino Pérez getting exactly what he wants.

The thing that really gets me is the timing. City's season has been a car crash in slow motion. They needed Pep to come out and say something defiant. Something like "Rodri is going nowhere, he's ours, end of discussion." Instead he practically booked the lad's flight. Threw in lounge access and everything.

I managed in the lower leagues for twenty years. If my best centre midfielder had been courted by a rival, I wouldn't have gone on television and said "well, we respect his decision." I'd have parked myself outside his house with a flask of tea and a copy of his contract until he saw sense.

But that's not how it works anymore, is it? Players have all the power. Agents have all the power. Managers just stand there smiling like greeters at a supermarket, waving people through and thanking them for shopping with us.

Pep Guardiola built something extraordinary at Manchester City. Multiple Premier League titles. A Champions League. A treble. But if this is how it ends, with him cheerfully dismantling his own squad one press conference at a time, then what was the point of all that building in the first place?

You don't hold the door open for your best player. You lock it. You hide the key. You pretend the door doesn't exist.

In my day, that was called management.