Brahim may be regretting his decision to exit Etihad for Real
While Sancho flourishes, Diaz is kicking his heels in Madrid
THEY were the three brightest sparks to be generated by the City academy.
And when chairman Khaldoon Al Mubarak announced they would be promoted to the first-team squad in 2017, it seemed the Blues’ investment in youth was paying big dividends.
Three years on, Jadon Sancho and
Phil Foden are both on the brink of stardom - but the third member of that talented young trio, Brahim Diaz, is still scrapping to emerge from the seething morass of talent at Real Madrid.
City will come to regret the fact that Sancho slipped through their fingers, especially as he left them for a token £8, with his contract to expire the next summer but his relationship with the club broken.
That regret will turn to remorse should Sancho return to the Premier League this summer - with United leading the chase.
The prospect of that happening led City to have an unusual clause inserted when Diaz told them, in the winter transfer window of 2019, that he wanted to pursue his boyhood dream and go to Real Madrid.
He joined them in a deal worth £22m, and with a sell-on clause which states that City will get any 15 per cent of his next transfer fee - or 40 per cent if United are the buying club.
Comparisons have been drawn between Sancho and Diaz leaving, but the two situations were completely different.
Sancho was impatient to play, and received assurances from Borussia Dortmund that he would.
City wanted to keep him and take him on their summer tour of the USA, but his refusal to sign a new contract saw him being dropped from the travel party and then sold.
Brahim left with City’s blessing after Real offered him a six-and-ahalf year deal. He had explained that playing for Madrid was his dream - there was never a hint that he was leaving to play more football, or for more money.
With stellar players like Eden Hazard, Karim Benzema, Luka Jovic, and Gareth Bale ahead of him, he faced the same problem as he did at City. Sancho’s move has been a huge success, as he has become a big hit at Dortmund and broken into the England reckoning - and is now lining up a big-money move this summer.
The chances of Brahim being involved against City in the Champions League are slim
Stuart Brennan
Foden is a step or two behind Sancho, but has made nine starts to Brahim’s one this season - and his path to the first-team is indicated by David Silva’s departure this summer.
Brahim has been patient. He turned down loan moves to both Real Betis and City sister club Getafe last month, proclaiming that he preferred to fight for his place at the Bernabeu.
He was held back by a hamstring problem he picked up in pre-season, and his campaign had barely got under way when an abdominal problem saw him back on the physio’s slab. Since then, he has played a handful of minutes, and was only used for 17 minutes, off the bench, in the dead-rubber Champions League group game against Bruges.
He did not make the bench for the other five games, so his chances of being involved against City in the Champions League this month are slim.
If Brahim had stayed at the Blues, the long-term injury to - and now possible departure of - Leroy Sane in the summer to Bayern Munich would have opened an avenue for him.