Pellegrini starts with 10 foreign outfield players in derby drubbing over United.

In years to come, the 166th Manchester derby could go down as the day English football died.
Take nothing away from Manchester City and their classy coach Manuel Pellegrini because this destruction of their rivals at the Etihad is a magnificent, eye-catching result.
Of deeper concern to the English game - and the national team’s head coach Roy Hodgson, who was watching from the stands - will be the way it was carried out.

Wasted journey? England manager Roy Hodgson attended the Manchester Derby yet City manager Manuel Pellegrini (below) didn't select a single English outfield player in his starting line-up

Manuel Pellegrini

It’s by no means unique in this country, but City began this fixture without a single English outfield player. This was football at the highest level of the Barclays Premier League and the champions of England - with a core of six English players in the starting line-up - were picked off at will by overseas imports.
Good for City. Not so good for the England team.
It is not the sole responsibility of Pellegrini to save English football from strangling itself, but  mis-matches like this are the reason FA chairman Greg Dyke has set up a commission to look into the future of the national team.
Apart from his English goalkeeper, Pellegrini picked seven nationalities - Argentinian, Belgian, Serbian, Brazilian, Ivorian, Spanish, and French - and watched them bury a team with a long-standing commitment to homegrown talent.

Joe Hart, the keeper who barely had a save to make, was City’s only English player until James Milner came on in the 71st minute.

England team-mates: Joe Hart, the only Englishman to start for City, shakes the hand of Wayne Rooney

United began with six England internationals, past and present, relying on the core values that have helped this club dominate the Premier League for 20 years. Judging by this match, it is not just United in terminal decline.
David Moyes’ team were blitzed. By pace. By precision. By guile. By movement. By ingenuity.
City were electrifying. It was a sad day, watching a team with six English players of international pedigree played off the park by this cultural melting pot.
‘There is room for English players in the team,’ claimed Pellegrini after strikes from Sergio Aguero (2), Yaya Toure and Samir Nasri blew United away. It is hard to see where, though.
‘We have four or five English players and I hope Micah Richards will play in the Capital One Cup,’ he added. ‘Milner usually plays, we have Joe Hart, and we also have Jack Rodwell and Joleon Lescott.’

Return: City boss Pellegrini hopes to have Micah Richards available for the Capital One Cup clash against Wigan

They are decent players, but they will need to be something else to displace Pablo Zabeleta, Fernandinho, Toure, Jesus Navas, Alvaro Negredo or Aguero.
‘We know the areas we need to improve,’ added Pellegrini. ‘We are just starting with a new style and it is something we must continue to work on.’
City are heading in the right direction with it, cuffing Viktoria Plzen 3-0 in the Champions League last Tuesday and following it up with yesterday’s 4-1 win over United. The gulf in quality between these two teams, however temporary, was brutally exposed.
Rio Ferdinand (who retired from international football earlier this year), Chris Smalling, Ashley Young, Michael Carrick and Danny Welbeck were outclassed. They were second to everything, except picking the ball out of the net.

Wayne Rooney could easily have been added to that list, but his stunning free-kick in the 87th minute just about exonerates the Manchester United striker.

Exception: Wayne Rooney scored a superb free-kick but his team-mates were outclassed by Man City on Sunday

Hodgson is 11 days away from picking an international squad for two World Cup qualifiers against Montenegro on and Poland October 11 and 15. England have to win them, but that is by no means guaranteed with a group of players which will include many of yesterday’s United team.
Replace the Premier League logos on City’s sky blue shirts with the BBVA La Liga badge and they would fit right into Spanish football. On this form City would give Barcelona or Real Madrid a game at the highest level in Spain. That was Pellegrini’s previous stamping ground. He left Malaga at the end of last season to put his footprint on English football.
There are lessons to be learned here - movement, flexibility and manipulation of the ball - or the English game as we know of it will soon be a thing of the past.
It’s performances like City’s that are behind Dyke’s attempt to save England from oblivion and win the World Cup in 2022. He had better get a move on.