Gianluigi Buffon, who won four league titles with Juventus, the UEFA Cup with Parma and the World Cup with Italy, has today explained why the best players reject massive Manchester City.

“It doesn’t surprise me that a lot of big players have turned down Manchester City,” said Buffon. “The best players in the world want to be playing for the top teams in the top three leagues, no more than five or six teams in Europe. It’s a very elite list and Manchester City have to accept the fact they are not one of them. I read that City were interested in me last summer. I don’t know if anything was tabled, but there is no way I could have considered it. I couldn’t justify leaving one of Europe’s most famous clubs for a team that are not playing football at the highest level.”