There has come a time in each of the past few seasons when Pep Guardiola has uttered the words “we are in trouble” to describe an injury crisis in his Manchester City squad.
This time, it has arrived sooner than ever, and despite it being something City have been able to live with in the past — they have won the Premier League title for four years in a row, after all — Guardiola says their current problems are the worst they have had.
“We have 13 players, so we’re in real difficulty, we’ve had to make the effort in the last week,” he told reporters after City were knocked out of the Carabao Cup by Tottenham Hotspur on Wednesday. “I think when we are in trouble, like we are now — we’ve never had this situation in nine years, many injuries for many reasons — the players make a step forward and they are more together than ever.”
Guardiola insists on having a small senior squad so he does not have too many players stuck on the bench, which risks them (and their agents) becoming unsettled and destabilising the dressing room, but the trade-off for operating this way is that with just a handful of injuries, his options can start to look extremely sparse.
It means that, with everybody fit, City have the strongest squad in the country in terms of quality, but that is often confused with having a large number of players, which is not the case and something that became evident last midweek, when City listed seven substitutes (rules permit clubs to list 12) for the Champions League game against Sparta Prague. Two of the seven were goalkeepers, two more were centre-backs, and another two were academy graduates.
With Rodri missing for the rest of the season, Kevin De Bruyne in the middle of what could be a two-month lay-off and Kyle Walker picking up a knee injury on international duty a couple of weeks ago, things got really stretched when, following the game against Wolves on October 20, Jack Grealish and Jeremy Doku picked up issues, too.
At present, those who are not known to have any injuries are: Ederson, Stefan Ortega, Rico Lewis, John Stones, Nathan Ake, Mateo Kovacic, Matheus Nunes, James McAtee, Ilkay Gundogan, Phil Foden, Bernardo Silva and Erling Haaland, with the 13th player Guardiola mentioned being either third-choice goalkeeper Scott Carson or, more likely, Manuel Akanji, if the knock he picked up before the Spurs game is as minor as the manager says it is.
This has led to a run on the left wing for Nunes, who has impressed of late, and which could offer him a chance to kickstart his City career after a quiet 2023-24 debut season. That is what Guardiola means when he says his fit players take an extra step during these difficult periods.
Guardiola had come to terms with the idea of City going out of the Carabao Cup — with injuries starting to bite, he has prioritised the Premier League games against Bournemouth and Brighton on the next two weekends, either side of Tuesday’s Champions League match away to Sporting Lisbon — so the result against Spurs in itself is not a major blow.
But the trip to north London only made matters worse on the injury front; Akanji got that apparently small injury in the warm-up, Ruben Dias “felt something”, requiring him to be taken off at half-time, Savinho sustained what looked like a very painful knock to his foot or ankle — “It wasn’t the bone, hopefully,” Guardiola said — and Josko Gvardiol clutched his groin late on.
“I couldn’t speak to him because the massage room was too busy, too crowded,” Guardiola told reporters regarding the Croatian’s scare, displaying a bit of gallows humour regarding the sheer number of players in need of post-match treatment. Guardiola had gone over to Gvardiol personally during the game asking if he was OK, with another injury in his squad being the last thing he needs.
The current situation helps to explain why, when staring at elimination from the competition with 16 minutes of the 90 to go, Guardiola brought on 18-year-old Jahmai Simpson-Pusey, a centre-back, for his senior debut rather than introduce Golden Boot-winning striker Erling Haaland, something which would have boosted their hopes of an equaliser exponentially, given the relative lack of goal threat City had on the pitch at the time.
But it also would have increased the chances of Haaland himself picking up an injury, Guardiola says.
“The plan was always for him not to play,” he told reporters. “The game against Southampton (on Saturday) was really demanding and I didn’t want to take the risk with him in this competition.”
That becomes harder when Haaland is deemed necessary, which could feasibly be for every match now until the FA Cup third round in January, apart from the Champions League home game against Feyenoord on November 26. There is not much wiggle room in the squad now, and so those available will be asked to do more.
Guardiola was actually asked whether Lewis, who is a teenager for three more weeks, has been playing too much, either in defence or midfield. To which he replied: “I don’t have an alternative. Our captain (Rodri) is injured. I don’t have an alternative.”
Walker, Grealish and De Bruyne are currently expected back after the international break that follows the November 9 trip to Brighton, although the way Guardiola has been speaking about the latter recently suggests this could be a difficult season for the Belgian.
Asked last night whether Spurs’ Swedish winger Dejan Kulusevski reminds him of De Bruyne, he took the opportunity to compliment his player. “No. No one is like Kevin,” he said. “In his prime, the amount of things that Kevin produced in a game, no one can do it.”
The problem is that Guardiola, going by his public comments at least, appears to believe those prime days are in the past.
“We have to (be careful). Sometimes the body says, ‘Warning, I am here’, because they are human, a lot of games, a lot of years, many years, long ones, and the consequences are here,” he said in a press conference at the start of October when discussing the 33-year-old De Bruyne’s injury, which was not initially expected to be serious.
“A car, when it goes to have something replaced, is not the same car. There is something that is a little bit worse. It’s not the same when you go to buy a new car. It’s normal. It’s part of the decisions you have to take when you think about selections, the future of the team and the squad. It’s not about the talent. There are players who are older and it happens, it’s normal.”
De Bruyne will no doubt have a contribution to make at some point and the good news for City is that Guardiola seems genuinely pleased with the team’s performances, despite the injuries and despite admitting his annoyance with his players’ effort levels in the 3-2 win against Fulham on October 5.
“It’s really good,” he said again on Wednesday night, echoing the message of previous weeks. “It’s been getting more difficult game by game, but the guys who are here are making an effort to be with us, fighting to be with us, playing with pain and focus, and living 24 hours for us. These guys — I will not forget it.”
At a time when Guardiola is weighing up his own future, with his contract expiring at the end of the season, this kind of thing could be crucial in getting him to stay.
And it will be more immediately important on the pitch.
City drew back-to-back Premier League games with Arsenal and Newcastle in late September but, thanks to some battling performances, have responded with three league victories in a row since. Those two trips to the south coast before the international break may not go the same way but, even if that’s the case, City went four matches without a victory in November and December last year yet were able to rally and secure the title during the second half of the season.
But they are struggling with injuries right now and things might get worse before they get better.
This time, they really could be in a bit of trouble.
(Top photo: Alex Pantling/Getty Images)