Medical expert: Aymeric Laporte may have suffered knee ligament damage after Man City latest
Man City centre-back Aymeric Laporte may have played the last two matches of the 2021-22 Premier League season with a medial collateral ligament injury.
That is the view of injury expert Ben Dinnery, who runs the Premier Injuries site and has a background in medicine and data analysis.
Laporte, 28, was taken off with half an hour to play in City’s 5-1 win over Wolves last month (11 May).
But the Spanish defender went on to play the full 90 minutes in the final two matches of City’s title-winning campaign.
City announced last Wednesday (25 May) that Laporte had withdrawn from the Spain squad ahead of their forthcoming Nations League fixtures
And Laporte himself revealed via Twitter the same day that he had been carrying a knee injury since the Wolves clash.
Dinnery explains that he has likely suffered an MCL setback.
“It was one of those where if Ruben Dias and John Stones were fully available, they would have decided to allow Laporte to rest and heal properly,” he told Football Insider’s Adam Williams.
“The fact they were chasing the league title factors into this as well.
“It is an MCL issue. It isn’t hugely problematic in terms of any long-term issues. But it is certainly something that needs to be managed and that they need to be aware of.
“In this period of downtime, you need to make sure you are getting your body right in time for the pre-season programme.“
Laporte scored four times in 44 appearances in 2021-22.
He was replaced in the Spain squad by Leeds United’s Diego Llorente.
In other news, Man City told to sell Raheem Sterling after “strange” update.