Jermaine Jenas believes Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola can play an important role in the club's bid to keep hold of their star players after they were given a two-year UEFA ban.
City were hit with a huge bombshell on Friday evening as they were suspended from all UEFA competitions for the next two seasons and fined £24.9million for "serious breaches" of UEFA's Financial Fair Play and club licensing regulations.
City will appeal the decision but they are now facing the very real possibility that a number of players could look to leave this summer as a result of their impending Champions League exile.
Jenas believes that City's biggest chance of keeping hold of all of their best players is if Guardiola decides to stay at the Etihad.
Jenas told BT Sport: "What happens if, let's say, in the next week or so, Pep Guardiola pulls you as a group of players and he sits down and goes 'listen, I am staying put. I am going to be a part of this, we are going to fight it, it might only be for one year, but I am staying. I'll sign a three-year deal, committing myself to this football club and we are going to build'.
"From a club perspective, that is what they need to do, in my opinion, to convey some strength with what is going on now.
"To steady the ship, the first thing that needs to happen is to hear something out of Pep, which tells me, as a player, that he is going to stay put.
"If that happens, that would tell me as a player that I can get my head around this, as it could be just for one year, we're going in the right direction and I have got the best manager in the world to get me going in the direction that I want."
