Man City may be forced to change Rodri plan after injury confusion

Manchester City midfielder Rodri hopes to be fit to face Everton in under two weeks but it was a strange week for the midfielder

Rodri's progress after his serious knee injury was never going to be straightforward, but last week felt a bit too wonky.

The Manchester City midfielder started it injured, having missed the Premier League win over Burnley on Saturday when he complained on Friday about his knee. Pep Guardiola described it as 'bad, bad, bad' and thought the safest thing to do was to leave him out completely.

That meant Rodri had sat out two consecutive games after surprising many by starting all three games in the previous week against United, Napoli, and Arsenal. If that run had pointed towards the Spaniard coming back to his fittest, the next two games were a reality check and as Guardiola landed in Monaco for the Champions League game he indicated that Rodri would not be repeating such an intense run any time soon.

"Now he is not injured but the week before was so demanding with United, Napoli and especially Arsenal and right now he's not able to play three games in a week at a top level - top intensity, demanding opponents," Guardiola said. "My feeling right now is he is not ready because he needs time.

"This type of injury, it is minimum one year and after that you must be patient.. Nico [Gonzalez] made an incredible game last game and is improving day by day and [Mateo] Kova[cic] will be quite similar. Tijjani [Reijnders] can play there, and see what happens."

Despite that, Rodri started in Monaco and played the first hour. Then, to the surprise of nearly everyone in West London, he started at Brentford five days later.

It felt confusing for Guardiola to say Rodri could not start three games in a week and then give him two starts in five days. He hadn't played the full game in the Champions League, but it still felt like a stretch.

So it proved, with Rodri feeling something in his hamstring after just 20 minutes and immediately signalling to come off. The initial reactions were that this was bad, with Gary Neville on commentary suggesting another major lay-off.

Cue more confusion then, when Rodri spoke to reporters after the game and said he didn't think it was anything big and he hoped not to miss a City game. He hasn't joined up with Spain for their two games over the next week, but reassured that this wasn't linked to his previous injury.

It may not be, and it may be fine, but even if it was just an unfortunate accident at Brentford it felt like City were asking for trouble. They have to be led by what the player feels to a large degree, yet having to rush in a player cold to a game after 20 minutes does not look like what anyone wants.

City want Rodri back to his best as soon as is possible, the player wants the same and it was never going to be easy to restore the best footballer in the world to his peak. Last week did feel particularly messy though and the Blues may have to tweak their plan and be a bit more cautious going forward for the sake of everyone if they are to get what they want.

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