The new owners at City went after Guardiola, Mourinho and Ancelotti 10 years ago... we wanted to be a world force and people laughed – not now!
WIGAN v MANCHESTER CITY GARRY COOK EXCLUSIVE
Almost 10 years since Cook sold the City dream to Sheikh Mansour’s Abu Dhabi United Group with a boast that Blues could become one of the elite clubs of world football, the former Nike marketing expert is now a key player in takeover negotiations at Wigan Athletic. And when the draw for the fifth round of the FA Cup put his current club on a collision course with his former employers, it was impossible for him not to think back to when his promise that City would one day eclipse Manchester United provoked laughter.
Even Cook could not use his considerable powers of persuasion to convince Guardiola to move to Manchester.
And, in an exclusive interview with Sunday Mirror Sport, he revealed City also got the same answer from Jose Mourinho and others. But the vision the club’s former chief executive had, when he was trying to convince the Sheikh to buy City from disgraced former Thailand Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra in the summer of 2008, has indeed come to pass.
“I’m pretty sure the people who laughed aren’t laughing quite so loudly now,” said the 55-year-old, who took up an offer to become a non-executive director at Wigan last May after a successful stint masterminding the huge growth in UFC.
“When I spoke to Abu Dhabi