Txiki Begiristain is going out with a bang.

If Erling Haaland's nine year, £247m contract wasn't enough, then more than £120m of transfer deals in January are a clear sign that the outgoing sporting director is keen to leave his mark on the Manchester City squad.

Just like when Pep Guardiola felt he couldn't walk away in November, Begiristain wants to leave the squad well-placed for the future, not just depart in the summer with an ageing, injury-prone group unable to compete for titles.

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Abdukodir Khusanov and Vitor Reis have arrived for a combined £63m, while Omar Marmoush will follow them to increase competition in attack for around £63m himself. The two centre-backs are 20 and 19 respectively, while Marmoush is just about to turn 26 so is in the prime of his career.

Haaland is 24 and will be a City player for the next decade. Phil Foden will surely partner him for that time, while City have Josko Gvardiol, Rico Lewis, Jeremy Doku, Savinho, Oscar Bobb, James McAtee and Claudio Echeverri all 22 or under. The future is clear to see.

All of those players are different builds, positions and qualities, but there is one thing that generally links them: a degree of pace. When Gvardiol signed, Begiristain and Guardiola hailed him as a player not just for the next season or two, but for the next decade: they have been thinking about what their squad will look like in ten years time for a while, now emphasised by Haaland's record-breaking contract.

Begiristain talks daily with Guardiola but also with Academy Director Thomas Krucken, and the recent change in approach at the City Football Academy was, in hindsight, a huge hint towards the kind of player City will target in future at senior level.

"We believe the speed of the game will increase, that's for sure," said Krucken on his arrival at City last summer, telling the Manchester Evening News that he was brought in to find the 'future player of the future game.' That is, to put the building blocks in place now so that City are preparing first team players ready to step up for whatever the senior environment might look like in a decade's time, not now.

"The speed of the game will increase so what does it mean for football, physically and social and psychological aspects," Krucken continued, and he has set out to develop a new academy development plan based around this idea of a 'future player'.

With City future-proofing their squad this month, all three incoming signings are blessed with pace and strength. One look at Khusanov's highlights reel for Lens show a rapid, strong defender, while Reis is said to possess similar qualities. Marmoush has 'elite speed and dangerous dribbling' according to those who have watched him in Germany.

Of course, if City are spending hundreds of millions on fast players for the future, it blocks the path of current academy players to break through. However, with Haaland's contract running until 2034, Khusanov signing until 2029, and seven others under contract until 2028 at the earliest, the future-proofing really has begun.

Maybe it heralds a different profile of transfer search. Maybe the era of small diminutive, skillful midfielders is over, to be replaced by faster, more direct signings like those City have targeted in January.

"It’s our job in the current time to prepare the under-11 and under-13 players for the game of 2029," Krucken said last year. His close colleague Begiristain is preparing for the same thing.