Man City’s 2012 title winners: where are they now?
Kompany coaches Bayern, Yaya Toure has Slovan Bratislava and David Silva is back playing at 40. Where the stars of City’s 2011-12 title team are in 2026.
Nov 1, 2019 · Updated Oct 17, 2026
The most dramatic finish in Premier League history came on 13 May 2012, when Manchester City ended a 44-year wait for the league title. Trailing Queens Park Rangers 2-1 going into stoppage time, City scored twice to win 3-2. Sergio Aguero’s winner came seconds after the final whistle had gone in Manchester United’s 1-0 win at Sunderland. It is still the only Premier League title decided on goal difference.
That squad, managed by Roberto Mancini, laid the foundations for everything City have won since. Fourteen years on, here is where the key members of the 2011-12 team are now. Season figures are Premier League appearances and goals in 2011-12.
| Player | 2011-12 apps | Goals | Where they are now (October 2026) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Joe Hart | 38 | 0 | Retired in 2024 after winning the Scottish Cup with Celtic |
| Vincent Kompany | 31 | 3 | Head coach of Bayern Munich |
| Pablo Zabaleta | 21 | 1 | Retired in 2020, moved into coaching |
| Joleon Lescott | 32 | 2 | Retired in 2017, coach with England’s U21 set-up |
| Gael Clichy | 28 | 0 | Head coach of Caen |
| Samir Nasri | 30 | 5 | Retired in 2021 |
| Gareth Barry | 34 | 1 | Retired in 2020 |
| David Silva | 36 | 6 | Out of retirement with Sha Tin in Hong Kong |
| Yaya Toure | 32 | 6 | Head coach of Slovan Bratislava |
| Sergio Aguero | 34 | 23 | Retired in 2021 |
| Carlos Tevez | 13 | 4 | Retired in 2022, now a manager |
| Mario Balotelli | 23 | 13 | Playing for Al-Ittifaq in the UAE |
| Edin Dzeko | 31 | 14 | Playing for Schalke 04 |
Joe Hart
The England goalkeeper started all 38 of City’s league games that season and won the Golden Glove with 17 clean sheets. After Pep Guardiola arrived, Hart was loaned to Torino in 2016 and West Ham in 2017. He then joined Burnley in 2018 and Tottenham in 2020, before a late-career revival at Celtic from 2021. His final professional game was the 2024 Scottish Cup final against Rangers on 25 May 2024, which Celtic won, and he retired at the end of that season.
Vincent Kompany
City’s captain and the leader of their defence, Kompany won four Premier League titles with the club. His last great moment was a long-range winner against Leicester City in the 2018-19 run-in, his first goal from outside the box for City. He left in 2019 to become player-manager of his first club, Anderlecht. He then took Burnley back to the Premier League in 2023, and on 29 May 2024 he was appointed head coach of Bayern Munich. He has won the Bundesliga in both of his seasons there, 2024-25 and 2025-26.
Pablo Zabaleta
The Argentine right-back joined City from Espanyol in 2008 and opened the scoring in the final-day win over QPR, his only goal of the season. He moved to West Ham in 2017 and retired on 16 October 2020. Zabaleta has worked as a BBC pundit at the World Cup, and in January 2023 he joined the Albania national team’s coaching staff as an assistant to Sylvinho.
Joleon Lescott
Signed from Everton in 2009, Lescott was a regular at centre-back in the title season, with 32 league appearances and two goals. He left for West Bromwich Albion in 2014, then played for Aston Villa, AEK Athens and Sunderland before retiring in 2017. Since August 2021 he has been part of Lee Carsley’s coaching team with England’s under-21s, and in 2024 he joined Carsley’s interim staff with the senior side.
Gael Clichy
Clichy joined City from Arsenal in 2011 and was first-choice left-back in the title season. He stayed until 2017, then played for Istanbul Basaksehir in Turkey and, until 2023, Servette in Switzerland. He was Thierry Henry’s assistant with France’s under-21 and Olympic teams. In December 2025 he took his first head-coach job, at Caen in France’s third tier.
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Samir Nasri
Another arrival from Arsenal in 2011, Nasri scored five league goals in his first season at City. He was loaned to Sevilla in 2016-17, then played for Antalyaspor and West Ham. His last club was Anderlecht in 2019-20, where he was signed by his old captain Kompany. Nasri confirmed in September 2021 that he had retired.
Gareth Barry
Barry anchored City’s midfield in 2011-12 with 34 league appearances. He joined Everton on loan in 2013, signed permanently in 2014 and moved to West Bromwich Albion in 2017. That September he broke Ryan Giggs’s record for Premier League appearances when he made his 633rd. Barry retired in August 2020. He later turned out for Hurstpierpoint, a 12th-tier club in Sussex, in 2024-25.
David Silva
City’s playmaker joined from Valencia in 2010. He scored six league goals in 2011-12 and went on to win four Premier League titles before leaving in 2020. At Real Sociedad he won the Copa del Rey in 2021. He retired in July 2023 after rupturing his anterior cruciate ligament, but on 7 October 2026, aged 40, he came out of retirement to sign a short-term deal with Hong Kong Premier League club Sha Tin.
Yaya Toure
Toure arrived from Barcelona in 2010 and was the driving force of City’s midfield, scoring six league goals in the title season. He left in 2018, had short spells with Olympiacos and Qingdao Huanghai, and moved into coaching. He was an assistant at Olimpik Donetsk, Akhmat Grozny and Standard Liege, an under-16 coach at Tottenham, and from November 2023 Roberto Mancini’s assistant with Saudi Arabia. In June 2026 he got his first head-coach job, a three-year contract with Slovak champions Slovan Bratislava.
Sergio Aguero
Aguero scored 23 league goals in his first season, the last of them the most famous goal in Premier League history. He became the club’s all-time top goalscorer with 260 goals in 390 appearances and won five Premier League titles. He joined Barcelona in 2021, but a heart problem, diagnosed as cardiac arrhythmia, ended his career after only a few games. He announced his retirement on 15 December 2021.
Carlos Tevez
Tevez played only 13 league games in the title season, scoring four goals. He then moved to Juventus in 2013 and had two more spells at Boca Juniors either side of Shanghai Shenhua, before retiring in 2022. He went straight into management with Rosario Central (2022), then Independiente (2023-24) and Talleres (July 2025 to May 2026).
Mario Balotelli
Balotelli scored 13 league goals in 2011-12. It was also his pass that set up Aguero’s title winner. Since leaving City in 2013 he has been football’s great journeyman: AC Milan (twice), Liverpool, Nice, Marseille, Brescia, Monza, Adana Demirspor (twice), Sion and Genoa. In January 2026 he signed a two-and-a-half-year contract with Al-Ittifaq in the UAE’s second tier.
Edin Dzeko
Dzeko’s stoppage-time equaliser against QPR made Aguero’s winner possible, and his 14 league goals made him City’s second-highest scorer that season. He joined Roma in 2015, then played for Inter, Fenerbahce and Fiorentina. In January 2026 he signed for Schalke 04 and scored on his debut, becoming the oldest scorer in 2. Bundesliga history. Schalke won promotion, and in August 2026 he extended his contract for another year in the Bundesliga.
Feature image courtesy: AFP/ Paul Ellis