Pep Guardiola Hands Yaya Toure Warning After Champions League Snub

Manchester City head coach Pep Guardiola has handed a warning to veteran midfielder Yaya Toure after he was omitted from the match day squad for the Champions League visit to Basel. The Citizens sealed a comfortable 4-0 win over the Swiss champions on the road, and they are now in pole position to reach the quarter-finals of the competitions with a home leg to come.

Following the game, the Catalan tactician was quizzed as to why Toure failed to make the travelling squad, and the Spaniard replied that the Ivorian was to blame for the exclusion. Toure apparently did not go through the required training sessions after recovering from illness, and this urged Guardiola to opt him out for the Basel trip, he said: “He is not injured – there were three or four days sick and he made one or two training sessions, that’s all. Hopefully he will be available for the FA Cup – it depends on him.”

Apart from Toure, there were plenty of positives on the playing field with both Leroy Sane and David Silva making their injury comebacks in the second period whilst Gabriel Jesus is expected to feature in the upcoming FA Cup clash versus Wigan Athletic on Monday night, he added: “For the next game at Wigan, they will be ready.”

The Citizens are now almost through to the final eight of the Champions League, and their focus is likely to lie in the Cup competitions with the Wigan game set to be followed by a Wembley meeting versus Arsenal in the League Cup final.

Guardiola’s side have pretty much sealed the Premier League title with a 16-point lead over second-placed Manchester United, and many pundits across Europe are expecting the Citizens to go and win an unprecedented quadruple which has never been achieved in English football.