Manchester City manager Manuel Pellegrini has revealed that his side’s star striker Sergio Aguero is still a few weeks away from returning to first team action. The Argentinian injured himself in City’s tie against Everton in early December and was subsequently ruled out for a minimum period of a month.
The Chilean said, “Sergio has a torn ligament and I think it will be long before that tie, probably in the first weeks of January, that he will play.”
According to the Manchester Evening news, Aguero could take at the maximum of eight weeks before he returns for City, but there are chances that he could return earlier to face Arsenal on January 18th.
A few days ago, Pellegrini had said that Captain Vincent Kompany and Edin Dzeko will also miss the upcoming games and will return only in January as they recover from a hamstring and a calf injury respectively. With Stefan Jovetic on the sidelines as well, City are left with Jose Pozo, the City u21 player, as the only striker at the club. Despite the injuries, they have won their last two games against Leicester City and AS Roma thanks to the good form of Samir Nasri and Yaya Toure. The duo will have to come with more goals if City are to maintain their title race credentials this season.
Late December will be a key period for Pellegrini as his side will play four games in the span of 12 days without their strongest squad. In addition, they have tough games coming up in January as they face Arsenal and Chelsea in back to back fixtures.
Barcelona will be a tough game
City’s reward for qualifying ahead of Roma in the UEFA Champions league is a tie with Barcelona in what will be a rematch of last season’s game. Pellegrini admitted that he would have taken someone else ahead of Barcelona but said it’ll be a good contest, “It is a tough draw, as the club is one of the best teams in Europe. Maybe we both would have liked to play against others, but we must play Barcelona – and they must play us – and there is not a problem.”
“I saw the Barca game in Getafe, But the Barcelona of today, and the one in February, will be two different teams,” he added.