Manchester Metropolis are adapting to life with out Rodri after their midfield talisman was dominated out for the remainder of the 2024/25 season.
The Spaniard went down injured throughout Metropolis’ 1-1 draw with Arsenal final month, with the membership confirming he had ruptured his anterior cruciate ligament.
That has left the champions unable to name upon the participant FourFourTwo have ranked as one of the best defensive midfielder on the earth as Pep Guardiola searches for an answer to what could possibly be a season-defining downside.
Rico Lewis recognized as Rodri substitute at Manchester Metropolis
The Metropolis boss has to this point turned to Mateo Kovacic to interchange Rodri, and with Kalvin Phillips unable to be recalled from his Ipswich City mortgage spell, the Croatian is the one like-for-like substitute for the Euro 2024 winner in Guardiola’s squad.
Positional flexibility is a key a part of the trendy recreation, nonetheless, and former Metropolis defender Richard Dunne believes that right-back Rico Lewis can provide Guardiola an alternative choice in defensive midfield.
“Rico Lewis has already confirmed that he can play in Rodri’s place,” Dunne instructed BetVictor. “He’s been superb this season and has been one among Metropolis’s key gamers.
“He clearly can’t do the very same job to the identical impact as Rodri, however he can do a barely totally different job equally properly. He’s an outstanding participant who can function in a number of totally different roles.”
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Rodri’s report in a Manchester Metropolis shirt is sort of with out comparability, with the 28-year-old going 74 video games unbeaten earlier than final season’s FA Cup ultimate defeat to Manchester United, however Dunne believes there’s sufficient high quality within the squad to compensate for his loss.
“Rodri is clearly nonetheless an enormous loss and the stats present they’re worse off with out him, however the extra the gamers get used to him not being there, the extra the stats will begin to even themselves out,” he added.
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“They’ve bought an excessive amount of high quality to simply depend on one participant, no matter how good he’s. In a few weeks’ time, they’ll have labored it out and will probably be as robust as ever.”
In FourFourTwo’s view, Lewis actually has lots of the attributes to achieve this place and Guardiola’s skill to set his group as much as leverage his squad’s strengths imply there’s a very respectable probability we are going to see the 19-year-old on this position in some unspecified time in the future this season.
