Adebayor signs

The fifth signing of the summer, the second £25m striker this week.

But I just can't get excited about this one.

Part of this is because, unlike anyone we've bought for some time, his purchase addresses no real felt need within the squad. Since the signing of Carlos Tévez we have had the strongest stable of strikers in my lifetime: Tévez and Roque Santa Cruz as the first choice pairing, with able support from Craig Bellamy and Valeri Bozhinov. Maybe if we'd bought Adebayor one week or one month ago - before the signings of the two South Americans - I'd be more enthusiastic.

But to buy him now? It feels like hoarding, like grasping, as if the policy has shifted from one of cautious recruitment and gradual development into exactly the sort of Florentino Pérez impression we were meant to be avoiding.

And Adebayor's signing feels different in another unappealing way too. Unlike anyone else we've bought since the takeover, I just can't get over the sense that he, more than any of our other recruits, is just here for the money. Of course, money is a factor in all of our signings - only the most myopic blue would deny this. But it remains true that money is more influential in some signings than others: and this move has none of the mitigating factors to be found elsewhere. Carlos Tévez wanted first-team football and to feel loved, RSC wanted to be re-united with Mark Hughes and to escape Allardyce's anti-football, Gareth Barry had wanted out for a year, and had watched Villa stagnate since Christmas, with little prospect of radical improvement this summer. But Adebayor? He was first choice at a club who, with the signing of Arshavin and the re-signing of van Persie, were on the up. And now he's left for his £170,000 per week. (This, regular readers will know, is why I didn't want Samuel Eto'o and don't want John Terry.)

It's that combination: a player we don't need, coming to City for questionable motives, that makes me a bit uneasy about it. Of course I recognise that Adebayor's a very talented striker - 46 in 105 in the Premier League is exceptional for a forward who arrived from Monaco as a raw twenty-one year old. And I recognise that the way we're going to get to where we want to go is through spending big money on better players. But it's simplistic to say that that should be the only aspiration. There are other things fans want too: a sense of stability, a loyal and well-motivated playing squad who show a decent work ethic, and the chance to build relationships with players rather than being presented with a whole new set of players every year. Yes, this is irrational. But we are football fans.

And so that is why, and I recognise the mixed metaphor here, this unnecessary acceleration along the agreed upon path in fact represents a step in the wrong direction.

I'll still cheer him though.