Manchester City announced on its official website on Tuesday that the club has signed English goalkeeper Marcus Bettinelli and France international attacking midfielder Rayan Cherki from Chelsea and Lyon respectively.

According to Manchester City's official statement, Bettinelli has signed on a short-term one-year deal with the club which will only run until the summer of 2026; whie Cherki has signed on a long-term five-year deal with the club which runs until the summer of 2030.

In addition, according to the news brought by This is Anfield's resident renowned Liverpool team correspondent David Lynch, Liverpool head coach Arne Slot did meet with Cherki at the end of last month according to the advice of some people, but the Reds' head coach had already decided that the player did not fit the team's tactical system.

Therefore, Liverpool has decided not to compete for the signing of Cherki, but to turn its attention to Bayer Leverkusen wonderkid Florian Wirtz.

It is worth mentioning that Lynch also added that before that, Liverpool had never decided to sign Cherki. Therefore, rumours that our website's notoriously infamous female rumour mongers "Ms. Titan", "Ms. Plan To" and "Ms. Hype Up" have been lying since mid-November last year that the Reds is interested in signing the player as a "replacement for Mohamed Salah" are indeed fake news!

As the old saying goes, Cherki plays as an attacking midfielder and Salah plays as a right winger. The two positions are completely unrelated. How can the player with Algerian descent going to replace Salah?!

At the same time, The Athletic's resident Raphael Honigstein, renowned German transfer journalist, also refuted the fake news that "Ms. Titan" had lied since July last year that Cherki "was actually very eager to join Borussia Dortmund".

He refuted that due to transfer budget considerations, the Bundesliga giants never planned to spend more than £35 million to sign Cherki like Manchester City did.

About Marcus Bettinelli

Marcus Bettinelli, 33, was born on May 24, 1992 in Camberwell, England. He is 1.94 meters tall and plays as a goalkeeper. He has dual English and Italian citizenship. His father Vic is the goalkeeper coach at Fulham.

Bettinelli joined Fulham's youth academy at the age of 14 and graduated in the summer of 2010. In the following years, Bettinelli was loaned-out to two lower English league clubs, Dartford and Accrington Stanley, , until January 2014 when he returned to Fulham and established himself in the first team.

In the same month, Bettinelli completed his Fulham first-team debut for the Cottagers in the FA Cup and the EFL Championship. Since then, he has become Fulham's undisputed first choice goalkeeper, and broke out to become one of the best goalkeepers in the EFL Championship. He also led the club reach the Premier League as a two-time EFL Championship promotion play-offs winner.

In the summer of 2020, Bettinelli moved to Chelsea as a free agent.

During his five-year spell with the Blues, Bettinelli only played once for the Premier League giants in all competitions, conceded 1 goal, and won the FIFA Club World Cup once with the club.

About Rayan Cherki

Rayan Cherki, who is only 21 years old, was born in Lyon, France on August 17, 2003. He is 1.77 meters tall and plays as an attacking midfielder. He has dual French and Algerian nationality.

Cherki joined the youth academy of non-league club Saint-Priest at the age of 6, joined the Lyon youth academy the following year, and completed his Lyon first-team debut in October 2019.

As soon as he debuted, Cherki was hailed as one of the best wonderkids in European football for his outstanding performances.

During his six-year spell with Les Gones, Cherki played 185 times for the Ligue 1 powerhouse in all competitions, scored 29 goals, provided 45 assists, and reached the Coupe de France Cup final once and the Coupe de la Ligue once with the club.