Argentine international striker Sergio Aguero faces a race against time to be fit for the World Cup in Russia after Manchester City boss Pep Guardiola revealed his club season was over.
Guardiola, whose side secured the Premier League title last Sunday, said the 29-year-old would be sidelined for four to five weeks following minor knee surgery.
Aguero is City’s top scorer with 30 goals in all competitions this season. The injury, suffered in training on March 10, does not appear to rule him out of Argentina’s World Cup campaign.
Asked if the striker’s season was over, Guardiola said: “Here, yeah. He will be out for four or five weeks. He is in Barcelona right now. We are going to fight to get him to the World Cup.”
The World Cup starts in mid-June, with Argentina due to play their opening match against Iceland in Moscow on June 16.
“Recovering from an arthroscopy on my knee,” Aguero tweeted on Tuesday. “Fully motivated to get back soon to the field.”
Aguero, who has 199 goals for the club, has not started a game since City’s victory over Chelsea on March 4.
Following a month-long lay-off he returned to action as a late substitute in the derby defeat to Manchester United on April 7, when he was hurt in a controversial challenge from Ashley Young that went unpunished.
The striker was this week named in the Professional Footballers’ Association’s Premier League team of the year.
Sergio Aguero in battle to be fit for World Cup
Sergio Aguero in battle to be fit for World Cup
- City striker injured knee in training in March.
- Has played last game for City this season.
Formula 1 champion Norris hungry for more glory
- The McLaren driver said that claiming the drivers’ crown had not changed his work ethic or his desire to be regarded a “hunter” rather than “the hunted“
MELBOURNE: Lando Norris said on Thursday that winning his first Formula One championship had only made him hungry for more as he gears up to launch his title defense at the Australian Grand Prix.
The McLaren driver said that claiming the drivers’ crown had not changed his work ethic or his desire to be regarded a “hunter” rather than “the hunted.”
“I’ve probably done the most training and things during the course of the off-season than I’ve ever done,” the Briton told reporters at Albert Park.
“So it’s certainly not the case that I was relaxing more or partying more or whatever it might have been. It was quite the opposite, in fact.
“No, I’m still just as hungry. I think it made me want it more, in a way, because you get that feeling.
“The same as when you have one win, you want another one in a race.
“For me, it was the same feeling as a championship; that one is amazing, but then you definitely want to achieve two.”
Norris won last year’s race from pole after arriving in Melbourne raving about the car’s performance during winter testing.
The constructors champions are less bullish about the MCL40 car’s off-season performance this year, with team boss Andrea Stella saying they were a step behind Ferrari and Mercedes.
Norris’s teammate Oscar Piastri, who led last year’s championship before finishing third, was similarly reserved about their early-season prospects, saying on Wednesday they should not be considered favorites to win in Melbourne.
Norris was more upbeat.
“Even if you’re second, third, or fourth quickest, I don’t think that’s on the back foot,” he said.
“I think that’s still a very good position to start in. And I think in previous years where it’s been harder to improve over the course of a season, we’ve certainly proved that you could.”
This year’s championship has plenty of unknowns due to F1’s major overhaul to chassis and engine regulations.
Ferrari’s seven-times world champion Lewis Hamilton said drivers faced their most challenging season ever as they grappled with the power management demands of the more electrified engines.
Norris said he was still adapting to the changes and would probably continue to well into the season.
“(It will) probably (be) at least a third of the way through this year until we drive different tracks, different tires, different tarmacs, different weather conditions until I can get close to that level of accuracy that I was requiring last year,” he said.
