Man City is paying price for bad recruitment and ageing players in the squad.Haaland has basically no backup,Rodri too has no competition.Walker's best attribute i.e his physicality is finally ditching him in mid 30's.Pep used to change majority of his players over 4 year cycle at his other clubs which he hasn't done at City so far.This may mean that he is indeed coming to end of the City cycle and that's why he doesn't want to buy players who will be a burden on next manager whoever it might be.