When Manchester City signed Craig Bellamy in their first transfer window since the 2008 takeover, it was a statement of intent. He had played under Sir Bobby Robson, Rafa Benitez and then-Blues boss Mark Hughes in a stellar career to date – but had never truly settled.. A divisive character, Bellamy had fallen out with the likes of Graeme Souness and Benitez, but clearly had the talent. Signed for £14m and re-united with Hughes, the early signs were good as he scored on debut against former club Newcastle, a match that is repeated this weekend when the pair meet in the last eight of the FA Cup.. Hughes would be sacked, however, and his replacement Roberto Mancini immediately took a dislike to Bellamy’s reluctance to train twice a day due to his own fitness plan to manage long-standing injuries. It would prove his downfall at City, with the fallout from a fight with a Manchester United fan proving the final straw.. ALSO READ: What Kevin De Bruyne injury means for Man City vs Arsenal – return date and starting XI hint. ALSO READ: Man City suffer huge Kevin De Bruyne injury setback ahead of Newcastle and Arsenal fixtures. Bellamy arrived at City in January 2009 alongside other big names Nigel de Jong, Shay Given and Wayne Bridge as part of the Abu Dhabi United Group’s first full window, with Hughes talking up the Wales international’s quality and untouched potential despite his huge transfer fees and collection of big clubs. He had left Newcastle after falling out with Souness (including a physical altercation in training) and accusing the Scot of lying.. Souness vowed Bellamy wouldn’t play for him again, with the Welshman banned from training after refusing to apologise. He was sent out on loan to Celtic under Martin O’Neill and Souness later said it was ‘him or me’ in regards to his Newcastle tenure.. Four years later, and Bellamy was at City – via more fall-outs and off-field troubles. It didn’t take him long to settle on the field, but he would also criticise the ‘clique’ of Brazilian players at the club. Carlos Tevez and Emmanuel Adebayor arrived in the summer 2009 to increase competition in attack – but he held his own with high-profile goals in the eventful win over Arsenal at the City of Manchester Stadium, and in the 4-3 derby defeat to United at Old Trafford. Then Mancini arrived.. With Bellamy on his own fitness plan to manage his injury problems, Mancini introduced double sessions – a clash that saw the pair never return to the same page. “It didn’t take long for a little friction to build between me and Roberto. He couldn’t understand why I didn’t train every day,” Bellamy would later say.. “He said I had to train every day. I told him I couldn’t because of my injury history. He said I had to do double sessions – morning and afternoon – and I told him I couldn’t.. “If I do two sessions, I put too much stress on my hamstrings. I am an explosive player. He shook his head. He said in Italy, you have to train all the time. It was frustrating. I had been doing so well. I had felt so comfortable with my routine and it had been getting the best out of me. Now Roberto wanted to change it.”. With the relationship hardly off to a perfect start, an incident after defeat to Hull in February 2010 was the beginning of the end for Bellamy at City.. “Roberto substituted me. It was a bad sign. I went out in Manchester that evening with Wayne Bridge and Shaun Wright-Phillips and at the end of the night, I allowed myself to get into a scrape with a United fan. It was a bit of pushing and shoving,” Bellamy explained.. “There was a group of United fans waiting for me as I went to get into my car. They were taunting me and because I was in a bad frame of mind, I got involved. It was nothing serious but it was serious enough that I aggravated my knee injury in the fracas. I was out for two weeks because of that. I came back to training and I did some running. Roberto said I would be running the next day too. I said I couldn’t do two days solid in a row.. “He said I had been off for two weeks so I had to. I told him I couldn’t. I had to stick to my programme. He called me into his office for a meeting with him, his fitness coach and the club doctor. He was confrontational from the start. ‘Is it okay for you to be out for two weeks and think you can decide what you are doing?’. “‘I am sticking to my programme, that’s all’, I said. ‘It has kept me fit all season and I don’t want to risk being injured now.’. “‘Okay, then, you have been away for two weeks,’” he said. ‘Now you can go home for the rest of the season. Go on. You don’t want to train.’ So I went home. I told Brian Marwood and Garry Cook what had happened. Garry came round to my house to talk about it. He said something had been lost in translation. I went in the next day and trained but Roberto and I didn’t speak after that.. “That was a cut-off. That was him done with me, really. Rafa [Benitez] was harsh. Roberto wasn’t far behind. He didn’t freeze me out. I still played and I still put in some good performances. But it became common knowledge we’d had a big disagreement and the tension between us grew.”. Bridge has also discussed another training ground incident where Bellamy and Mancini clashed.. “I remember one time Bellamy asked him a question and Bellamy was our best player at the time – and he sent him home. And that was Bellamy done!” Bridge said last year.. “He basically said something like ‘what happens if the centre-back goes this way?’ Something like that. And he just told him to shut up and do what he is told. He just asked about what would happen if something happened and he wouldn’t answer it.. “He thought Bellamy was disrespecting him, but he wasn’t. He was one of the best trainers, he was great with the kids and I think he got a bit misunderstood sometimes. He would work his arse off for you and I think Mancini saw it as disrespect but it wasn’t at all. Bellamy loves the game and would put his heart and soul into it.”. Bellamy would survive the 2009/10 season, but when it looked like he would be omitted from the 2010/11 Premier League squad list, he went to the media to threaten retirement if that was the case.. “If I don’t get in the 25-man squad, I don’t know what I will do. I might finish, full stop,” he said. “I’ve tried to ask the question but I can’t get an answer and, reading between the lines, it doesn’t look great for me. I’ve felt in the way this summer, with everyone. It just feels different. This game is ruthless and I feel I am not going to be part of it. I can see it from a distance and I find that very difficult to take because I really enjoy playing for Manchester City.”. “He [Mancini] hasn’t spoken to me since February. I don’t think you have to be high-fiving the manager and speaking to him on a day-to-day basis but, with this 25-man squad, all the indications me and my agent have had are that my name will not be on it.”. After being left out of the Europa League squad to face Romanian side Timisoara, Bellamy moved to hometown club Cardiff on loan for the year, joining Liverpool the following summer after being barred from City training on his brief return.. When City and Newcastle face each other on Saturday both sets of fans will have fond memories of Bellamy. And both may rue their respective managers at the time for falling out with the mercurial forward and depriving them of a possible cult hero for a much longer spell.
