Pep Guardiola is now in the midst of his ninth season in charge of Manchester City.
Having seen his side become the first team to win four consecutive Premier League trophies at the end of last season, Guardiola’s team have won four and drawn one of their opening five games of the new campaign.
In addition to that, City drew their opening Champions League match against Inter Milan and beat Watford 2-1 in the third round of the Carabao Cup.
However, one big issue that has recently been handed to the City manager is Rodri suffering a knee injury, which has been reported to be serious enough to keep the midfielder out until the end of the season.
This has now led to one pundit sharing his thoughts on the ways in which Guardiola could deal with this particular issue facing him and the team.
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Danny Murphy shares how Pep Guardiola could solve Rodri problem at Man City
When asked in a recent video shared on the talkSPORT YouTube channel how he thinks City could deal with Rodri’s absence, Danny Murphy shared numerous options Guardiola could take.
He said: “[Mateo] Kovacic can play in there reasonably well against the majority of opposition.
“I think we’ll see [John] Stones used in there maybe because obviously they got cover in centre-half and Stones has that nice footballing ability and the defensive mindset.
“[Manuel] Akanji has played in there before, they’ve got Rico Lewis who is a different type because he’s more energetic and busy. He’s not got that physical presence but they’ve got lots of options.
“Realistically, if it is that bad, they’ve only got to last until January, they could go and get someone.”
Guardiola has the managerial credentials to deal with Rodri’s absence
Having won six Premier League titles during his time at the Etihad Stadium, Guardiola has shown previously that he can get his side to win trophies whilst dealing with injury issues and having big players out of action.
For example, last season saw Kevin De Bruyne miss a large chunk of the campaign, as well as Erling Haaland who missed some weeks with an ankle issue.
Despite that, the Blues still managed to regain the title and once again establish themselves as the best team in the country.
With Murphy now naming the players he thinks Guardiola could turn to to do a job in midfield, in addition to the prospect of signing a new midfielder during the upcoming January transfer window, the City boss certainly has options but will now have to find out what the best ones are for the team going forward.
