Pep Guardiola has defended his decision to start Kyle Walker against Bournemouth after the Manchester City star trained for just ‘six minutes’ prior to the match.
City’s unbeaten start to the Premier League season came to an end on Saturday as they shockingly lost 2-1 on the south coast.
Antoine Semenyo and Evanlison put the home side into dreamland and though Josko Gvardiol pulled a goal back, the Cherries survived a late onslaught to record their first ever win against the Citizens.
The result, combined with Liverpool’s 2-1 win over Brighton, sees City knocked off top spot in the Premier League table.
Guardiola’s side have been struggling with injury and fitness issues of late, with the likes of Jack Grealish, Ruben Dias and John Stones missing the trip to the Vitality Stadium.
One player who did play the full 90 minutes was Walker, surprisingly so given that just a few days ago Guardiola said the right-back had ‘no chance to play the next games’ after missing the last few matches.
The England international put in a woeful performance and was clearly not ready to start, something his manager confirmed post-match, revealing he hadn’t trained for nearly three weeks prior to the Bournemouth loss.
‘Kyle, his last game was with the national team to reach 100 games and since then could not train one session,’ Guardiola told reporters post-match.
’19 days he didn’t train with us until yesterday. Yesterday he did six minutes. It’s what it is. Accept it.’
Guardiola also confirmed that fellow defenders Manuel Akanji and Nathan Ake were also playing through the pain barrier, bemoaning his side’s injury problems as a key factor in the defeat.
Walker however said they would: ‘Not use that as an excuse. We’ve got players on the bench and players that started today that felt there were fit to start.
‘We have to give full credit to Bournemouth and move on, move onto the next one. To come here and not get the win is always disappointing.
‘Sometimes you have to play the game with emotion. Sometimes, when we’ve got the injuries we’ve got, and the lads are tired, and they [Bournemouth] have had six days to prepare for this game and everything like that, sometimes you need to play with your heart.
‘I felt in the last ten minutes, we came back into it, but to go 2-0 down, it’s always going to be an uphill battle.’
Following their Carabao Cup exit midweek, City will now be aiming to avoid a third consecutive defeat when they travel to Sporting Lisbon in the Champions League in their next game.
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