Laporte to miss first month of the season due to injury

defender

will miss the first month of the season due to knee surgery.

City manager Pep Guardiola has confirmed that the Spanish defender was playing through pain in the final stages of last season, which ended with the Citizens winning the title. Erling Haaland, Kalvin Phillips and Julian Alvarez will be available for the Community Shield match against Liverpool on Saturday, but Laporte will be sidelined for some time.

"Laporte is injured. He had knee surgery after last season, played the last two or three games with an important injury and made an incredible effort.

"He had surgery, so far is doing really well but you have to be careful with a knee. I think through August he will be out, September I think maybe he will start to be with us."

City are still trying to sign Mark Cucurella as a replacement for Zinchenko from Brighton. However, Guardiola avoided an answer in this regard.

He said:

"He is a Brighton player, I cannot say anything else.

On adding a left-back, he added:

"If it is possible yes if not we stay with what we have. We have enough players who can play there. I never complain about the squad I have."

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