Manchester: Manchester City are waiting anxiously on Samir Nasri’s fitness after he suffered a suspected hamstring tear in Tuesday’s Champions League defeat at Real Madrid.
If the injury is as serious as suspected, the French forward could be out for three weeks.
The injury happened in the first half of City’s 3-2 defeat in the Bernabeu and he had a scan in Manchester yesterday.
Last night there were unconfirmed reports in France that Nasri spent last week’s international break in Las Vegas. City’s players were given time off if not involved with their countries. The Spanish press were unforgiving yesterday as City’s defenders were awarded marks out of 10 that hovered around two or three in the Madrid paper Marca. Given that Roberto Mancini’s team came within five minutes of beating the Spanish champions, this seems rather harsh. But City must learn as they try to find their way out of a group that also contains German champions Borussia Dortmund and Ajax from the Netherlands. In four away Champions League games this season and last, City have won only one, at Villarreal, and lost three, at Madrid, Bayern Munich and Napoli. Only once have they kept a clean sheet.
City’s second game is at home to Dortmund in a fortnight and Mancini should be worried. However, his best player on Tuesday night, Yaya Toure, said: “It was a big improvement on last year. It’s really important this year that we do better than last year. After a couple of months of playing in the Champions League you will see a different City.”
