Pep Guardiola fires brutal warning to Kevin De Bruyne & John Stones over Man Metropolis futures
Pep Guardiola has warned Manchester Metropolis’s ageing core that they could want to go away the membership if they’re bodily unable to deal with the growing workload.
Metropolis have been suffering from an harm disaster all yr and have not too long ago misplaced centre-back duo Manuel Akanji and John Stones to contemporary health points, highlighting why the membership parted with the very best a part of £65m to signal each Vitor Reis and Abdukodir Khusanov within the January switch window.
In addition to accidents, Metropolis have additionally needed to cope with an ageing core – 11 of his squad shall be over 30 years previous in September – which Guardiola doesn’t consider can compete in opposition to youthful, more energizing facet.
For these gamers who can not reliably play a number of video games each week, Guardiola acknowledged it could be time for them to maneuver on.
“That may be a actuality,” Guardiola confessed. “Now we have to sit down down with the docs, with physios, with the gamers, with the brokers, and be clear that a few of them can not maintain each three days, each month, each two months, enjoying each three, 4 days.
“So that is the fact. There’s yet another yr, [then] a World Cup.”
Singled out for a line of questioning was Kevin De Bruyne. Whereas broadly thought to be among the best midfielders on the planet, the injury-plagued 33-year-old was named on the bench for the current Champions League defeat to Actual Madrid and has began simply 11 occasions within the Premier League all season.
Requested why De Bruyne didn’t begin in opposition to Metropolis, Guardiola bluntly admitted: “It is only a choice. It is on what I’ve seen – for a number of causes.
“Additionally Jeremy [Doku] did not play – the final sport he performed was Ipswich, he was unbelievable, after which afterwards he was injured. However possibly for the calls for of the best way we have to play, for the absence of power that we’ve got and physicality, we’d like extra management and never up and down.”
