Erling Haaland missed Manchester City’s 3-1 defeat at Real Madrid on Wednesday, as Pep Guardiola’s side missed their star striker badly.
Haaland, 24, suffered a knee injury towards the end of City’s 4-0 win against Newcastle last weekend.
Speaking after the defeat, which saw City dumped out of the UEFA Champions League 6-3 on aggregate, Guardiola confirmed the situation regarding Haaland.
Erling Haaland injury update
“Erling, yesterday, tried to train after the action against Newcastle in the last minutes. Probably, with the images (scans) we have done, it’s fine but he has discomfort walking, for example with stairs, and we spoke yesterday and this morning and he said he’s not ready, he doesn’t feel good,” Guardiola said.
“Not far off, was close but not enough. He trained a bit yesterday, but we spoke yesterday, this morning, and he said he doesn’t feel good so another one. Of course Erling is massively important for us, you don’t need to be a manager to realize, but it is what it is, during the seasons it happens, we are used this season to many cases and it could not be differently today.”
How will this impact Manchester City?
City host Liverpool on Sunday so obviously the timing of Haaland’s injury is far from ideal. But Guardiola won’t risk him.
Omar Marmoush scored a hat trick against Newcastle last weekend and is likely to start up top in a fluid front four with the likes of Foden, Doku and Grealish buzzing around.
But if you add in Kevin de Bruyne also not coming off the bench against Real Madrid (presumably due to fitness) and Haaland suffering this knee issue, Guardiola is without two of his talisman being fully fit at a crucial point of the season.
City have dragged themselves back into the top four in recent weeks but if Haaland is out for an extended period of time their resurgence is going to be a short one.
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