Rodri suffers 'big' injury setback as Man City boss Pep Guardiola shares diagnosis

Manchester City midfielder Rodri is sidelined until after the September international break, Pep Guardiola has confirmed, following a groin injury sustained at the Club World Cup. The Spanish international suffered the setback during his appearance against Al Hilal in the last-16, where he picked up what Guardiola has termed a 'big injury'.

According to the Manchester Evening News, Rodri has been largely working on his own since returning to the City Football Academy, only recently joining in team sessions but still missing out on the squad for an upcoming friendly in Palermo and unlikely to complete a full match against Wolves.

Guardiola remains optimistic that the Ballon d'Or winner might make brief appearances in the games against Wolves, Tottenham, and Brighton, but he doesn't anticipate Rodri being at peak performance until after the international break. The focus now is on safeguarding his recovery.

"Rodri is getting better but he had a big injury in the last game against Al Hilal. He has trained better in the last few days, hopefully after the international break is when he will be really fit," Guardiola explained.

"Hopefully in these games he can play some minutes but what is important is he doesn't have pain because we don't want this Rodri coming back injured.

"We try desperately to avoid that. He has been training the last two sessions with us and that's good."

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Rodri is among four players who have been left behind to avoid jeopardising their fitness. Phil Foden, Josko Gvardiol and Claudio Echeverri are all not fully fit as well.

Foden and Gvardiol will be eyeing a starting spot against Wolves, while Echeverri's future remains uncertain due to loan interest and an excess of non-homegrown players for City to include in their Champions League squad. Guardiola mentioned that Foden has a knock, but didn't dismiss his chances of playing in the Wolves match with a week to recuperate.