Sergio Gomez joined Manchester City as a replacement for Oleksandr Zinchenko this summer but has found playing time in the Premier League hard to come by – 106/900 minutes of PL football.
The 22-year-old has been used consistently in Europe but may have blown his chance to start a league game after being sent off in Tuesday’s Champions League stalemate with FC Copenhagen.
Where will Manchester City finish in the Premier League this season?
1st
2nd
3rd
4th
5th or lower
Kyle Walker is currently injured, so Joao Cancelo is the obvious replacement at right-back. But as the Pep Guardiola doesn’t quite trust Gomez, he used Manuel Akanji in a makeshift role to allow Cancelo to stay at left-back in Saturday’s 4-0 win over Southampton.
A top performance by Gomez against Copenhagen might have given Guardiola a selection headache ahead of Sunday’s Premier League meeting with Liverpool, but he might have ruined his opportunity.
Gomez was sent off after half an hour on Tuesday night, failing to make a tackle, giving away two fouls, failing to make an interception and failing to make a clearance.
Tyrone Marshall of the Manchester Evening News gave him a player rating of 4/10 and called his decision ‘poor’ to bring down Hákon Haraldsson which led to him being sent off. Michael Graham of 90min gave Gomez a player rating of 3/10 and called his foul ‘clumsy’.
The Spanish U21 international has made eight appearances in all competitions this season, grabbing one assist. Gomez has amassed 316 minutes of playing time, starting three games in Europe and just one in the league, but Guardiola may not take any risk over the weekend.
In other news, stats show Julian Alvarez failed to vindicate Pep Guardiola decision
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