Kompany out for ‘up to six weeks’, Guardiola assesses options

Mark Scott
Vincent Kompany: Suffers another injury setback

Pep Guardiola has confirmed he will be without captain Vincent Kompany for up to six weeks, but has no plans to play Yaya Toure in defence.

Kompany is back on the treatment once again after a consultation with Dr Ramon Cugat at his Barcelona surgery revealed the Belgian had sustained ligament damage.

Guardiola said: “They confirmed what our doctor said. It’s a knee ligament. He will be four to six weeks out.”

Guardiola was then asked whether we could see the recently reintroduced Yaya Toure step in as his replacement at centre-back, but the Spaniard was not particularly keen on the idea.

“Yaya can play in many positions but I think we have other options to play in central defence,” he added at his Friday press conference.

“What happened in Barcelona happened once, and that was because we had a lot of problems.

“We didn’t have players and he played amazing, but now my plans are that Yaya’s going to play more in offensive terms, he will decide the last pass, help our build-up in the last part of the pitch.

“We have other options, Fernandinho can play there, Sagna can play there. We cannot forget at Crystal Palace, after one and a half months injured, Bacary played his first game and played as a central defender, he played awesome. We have other options to solve that problem.”