‘Disturbing’ injury will keep Haaland out until February

Erling Haaland will miss the rest of this month in a major blow to Manchester City’s hopes of repeating last season’s trophy treble.

City’s leading goalscorer, with 19 in all competitions so far this season, was forced to sit out training this week after aggravating the foot injury that has kept him out since the defeat at Aston Villa on Dec 6.

Haaland will miss today’s Premier League trip to Newcastle, the FA Cup fourth-round tie at Tottenham on Jan 26 and the home league clash with Burnley on Jan 31.

But he will fly out with the rest of the City squad for a winter training break in Abu Dhabi after today’s match and manager Pep Guardiola is keeping his fingers crossed the Norwegian striker will be back for the game at Brentford on Feb 5.

Guardiola is concerned that the injury has proved more serious than first thought. “It’s a little bit of a disturbing problem in his foot,” he said. “The doctors decided to stop [ him training] for one week and maybe he will restart in Abu Dhabi.

“Hopefully at the end of this month he’ll be ready. It [the injury] was a bit more than we expected. It’s a bone, it needs time.

“When you are injured at the end of November you miss a lot of games. It’s the toughest period.

“We miss Erling a lot. We need him. Hopefully he can play the last four or five months of the season without a problem.”

Haaland’s absence will be softened somewhat by the return of Kevin De Bruyne, who could make his first start since the opening day following hamstring surgery.

Already without John Stones, City will also be missing another defender in Manuel Akanji for the rest of the month. Jack Grealish is a doubt today because of illness.

It has also emerged that City’s senior players held a summit meeting last month to ensure no one

Recovery: City hope Erling Haaland will return for their trip to Brentford