Maresca can create 'siege mentality' at Man City, claims Mills

Enzo Maresca can create a "siege mentality" off the back of Manchester City's guilty verdict, so says Danny Mills.

Earlier this week, the Premier League confirmed City had been found guilty of breaching the competition's financial rules across a nine-year period between 2009 and 2018.

City still insist they are innocent and have pledged to fight the ruling and have until Friday to appeal it, while a sanctions hearing will take place separately.

Premier League chief executive Richard Masters said City had "systematically broken Premier League Rules for nearly a decade" and described the decision as the "most significant" in the competition's history.

Former City defender Mills, however, feels Maresca can use the situation to his advantage.

Mills told Stats Perform: "For Maresca, I think you can create that siege mentality and just go, 'Look, all we can do is do what we do now and get as many points as possible and just play football. You're all getting paid, lads. You're still getting paid. It's not a problem.'

"This is not going into administration and the club's going to go bust, and next week you might not have a contract, or you might not have a job.

"This is not like League Two when it was happening with Bury and things like that. Completely different scenario. So, ultimately, if the Manchester City owners weren't allowed to remain in charge, somebody would take them over.

"Wouldn't be a big problem for them. We've seen what's happened at Chelsea and everywhere else. So, yeah, I think you just have to say, look, 'Let's dig in, lads. It's the world against us. Let's just keep winning football matches and whatever stick we get, we're going to get and it's not our fault. It's not of our doing, but we're going to have to take it'."

Pep Guardiola has come out in support of City, while Rodri said last week that the players would not look back on their success at the club in a different light following this verdict.

In the years they have been found to have breached the rules, City won three Premier League titles, while they then went on to enjoy a period of dominance after 2018.

Mills, though, does not think any of the players who won titles at the club will be rushing to give away their medals.

He added: "[The Manchester City players] would not have been aware that there was effectively cheating going on or sports doping, whatever you want to call it. I'm not sure many of the managers did either.

"When you talk about Roberto Mancini going, 'Well, it wasn't my fault. Nothing to do with me.' Pep Guardiola has come out and been slightly, well, a lot more backing of the club, and he's got behind the club at this point.

"Obviously, there's an appeal process we expect that will happen in the near future. But it's hard as a player. I've seen some pundits say, 'They'll all be wanting to give their medals back.' No they won't. If they give their medals back, are they going to give back their bonuses, their contracts, their investments? No, it's not going to happen.

"The problem that you've now got is it's so far on from when it happened. It's going to be so difficult to punish those that were there at the time. Retrospective punishment is very, very difficult. You can only really punish now and going forward. And of course, that's a lot of the players who are at the football club who had nothing to do with this at all."

City sit top of the Premier League with a perfect record so far in 2026-27. They travel to Liverpool in their first game back after the international break.