A big blow for the treble winners.
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00:00 Michael, obviously City have suffered again due to injury, John Stones this time.
00:05 What impact can that have on City because it surely can't be positive.
00:09 The role he's been able to play over the last couple of seasons has been incredible for them.
00:14 How important is he and how much of a blow is it for Pep Guardiola's side?
00:18 Yeah, really big blow for City.
00:20 He's a very important player for them and plays a very unique role in the team.
00:24 That he starts centre-back and basically when City have the ball,
00:27 moves up into midfield, the other four centre-backs kind of shuffle inwards and create a back three
00:31 almost and then Stones very quickly when they lose the ball drops back.
00:34 So he plays a really important role and no one else in the team can really do that.
00:38 Perhaps actually the best at doing it is Rico Lewis but he more kind of starts right back
00:43 and moves into midfield.
00:44 Manuel Alcange tried it at Stamford Bridge.
00:46 He's able to do it but certainly nowhere near the same level as Stones.
00:52 Stones is brilliant at it and plays such an important role and actually played such a
00:55 big role towards the end of last season when they were going for every trophy under the sun.
00:59 So yeah, it's a big blow for City and I mean actually Guardiola spoke about it after the
01:04 injury was confirmed and basically said that along the lines of it's a real issue that
01:09 you can't afford to have him and Rodri out and that was the case recently when Rodri was suspended
01:14 and of course they lost all three games that Rodri was suspended for.
01:17 So I think that having them two is almost the double pivot at the base of the field,
01:22 let's say, is a really important aspect for City.
01:24 That's when City are at their best and to not have Stones, to not have De Bruyne as well,
01:30 which is a big absentee as we all know for City, it does impact the way they play and
01:35 I mean just on a slightly wider point, City, if you'd asked me this time a week ago,
01:39 I'd say they've got two injuries.
01:40 They've now got six injuries.
01:42 Ederson, Kovacic, Acabel pulled out of international duty.
01:45 John Stones is injured now as well.
01:47 De Bruyne, Sergio Gomez, they come back from the international break and play Liverpool,
01:52 Tottenham Villa, I mean for the top five.
01:55 So they've got some really big fixtures and they could really do with some of those players,
01:59 kind of these issues and injuries not being too severe.
02:02 So that's certainly what they'll hope from their perspective and just on Stones' injury,
02:06 Guardiola said last week he's going to be out for a while and then was asked at the
02:11 weekend and he said well it's not as bad as I first feared but they didn't get any time frame.
02:15 So we don't know, who knows, we could come back and he's back to the Liverpool game.
02:20 I'd be surprised at that personally, just given Guardiola's initial comments but
02:23 yeah we'll have to see and as I say, big blow for City at the moment to not have John Stones available.