Mancini coy on Aguero injury

SERGIO AGUERO has suffered a mysterious “stupid” foot injury that may rule him out for at least two weeks and could cost Manchester City a first league title in 44 years, according to Roberto Mancini. The City manager refused to offer precise details regarding the nature and cause of the problem, insisting he would “tell at the end of the season”.

But with Carlos Tevez still not fit enough to start, Mancini admitted he could “not trust” Aguero’s natural replacement Mario Balotelli with the main striker’s role. Aguero suffered the problem ahead of last Saturday’s game at Stoke City, where the forward watched the 1-1 draw as a spectator.

“I don’t know what’s happened with Sergio – he had a problem in his foot,” Mancini said. Asked if this had occurred in a match or in a different scenario the Italian said: “It’s better that we don’t talk about this. For us it’s a big problem because we lose Sergio against Stoke, tomorrow he can’t play [against Sunderland]. We hope that he can recover for Arsenal [on April 8th]. It is a stupid injury but not his fault. He can’t play with this injury for one week, 10 days, two weeks. No, it didn’t happen at home, it happened here.”

Mancini ruled out another player causing the problem and, when pressed if Aguero had maybe stubbed his toe or something else, said: “No, I’ll tell you when the season is finished.”

The City manager indicated the forward’s absence at a time when Tevez is not ready to start could be costly. “For this reason I am really disappointed for what has happened last week [Aguero’s injury]. It is impossible we can lose a player to a stupid situation,” he said.

Tevez has made substitute appearances in City’s last two games and he played for the reserves this week. But Mancini insists he will not start against Sunderland. “No. Next game maybe because he has improved a lot in the last 10 days.”

Aguero has scored 24 goals in 41 City appearances this season and Balotelli has 15 in 29. But Mancini was frank when assessing whether the Italian could be trusted. “No, never. But Mario is like this. No, I don’t trust Mario but he is like this. I don’t think anyone can trust Mario. But he is a top player and he can do everything. He could easily score two goals tomorrow or in the next game at Arsenal. But we can’t trust him. He is a top player, he can do everything in a game, he can score three, he can take a red card. Up until now he did well. And he can be important for us in the last eight games.”

This week Balotelli flew to Milan and interrupted an Internazionale press conference to congratulate the manager Andrea Stramaccioni, on his appointment. Mancini laughed off the incident and the pictures of him earlier in the week apparently clashing with the 21-year-old at training.

“I can’t take him and put him in his house for two days,” he said. “Probably the moment will arrive when he understands what he should do when he has two days off. I hope for him [he grows out of this behaviour] because he needs to improve in this.”

Mancini, who should have Vincent Kompany available against Sunderland and Joleon Lescott against Arsenal, denied Alex Ferguson’s claim that bringing back Tevez was an act of desperation.

“It is not important what Sir Alex said on this. I have a big respect for him but it is not important, the same for him in what I say,” said Mancini who was also calm about the comments of the City executive Patrick Vieira, who claimed the major clubs like United can get the benefit of referee’s decisions. “Sometimes it can happen like this, everywhere.”