Man City sack Roberto Mancini, their best manager in 40 years

Malaga coach Manuel Pellegrini favourite to take over after Italian fails to achieve 'stated targets'

Manchester City manager Roberto Mancini

IT'S A HARD life being a football manager. In November Roberto Di Matteo was given the boot barely six months after guiding Chelsea to the most glorious night of their lives, the defeat of Bayern Munich in the Champions League final, and now Roberto Mancini has been sacked by Manchester City less than a year after he masterminded their first Premier League title in 44 years.

This season hasn't exactly been a disaster for the Sky Blues. They are runners-up to Manchester United in the league, and on Saturday they appeared in the final of the FA Cup for only the second time in 25 years. In days gone by that would have been marked down as a pretty good season – particularly for City, who, only 15 years ago, were languishing in Division Two.

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Bill Mann is a football correspondent for The Week.co.uk, scouring the world's football press daily for the popular Transfer Talk column.