As Manchester City fought and scrapped their way to a 2-all draw against Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park on Saturday you could see the toll that City’s injury crisis has had on Pep Guardiola’s squad. Too much is being asked of too few, as fatigue is affecting a host of City’s key players. To their credit, Manchester City’s fit players keep stepping up when required. But they are suffering under a heavy workload. It appears that Manchester City’s only hope for now is getting players back from injury sooner rather than later.
But that doesn’t appear to be happening in the immediate future. Speaking after Manchester City’s hard-fought draw against Crystal Palace Pep Guardiola told the media that there doesn’t appear to be an end in sight to City’s injury crisis. With matches against Juventus and Manchester United to come this week, his update does paint a bleak picture for the week ahead. But that’s the hand Manchester City have been dealt so they must power on.
#### [READ MORE: If nothing else the fighting spirit is still there in the Manchester City squad.](https://esteemedkompany.com/2024/12/08/if-nothing-else-the-fight-is-still-there-in-this-manchester-city-squad/)
Guardiola was asked after City’s draw with Crystal Palace if he could get any more out of his players, who have given so much to Manchester City’s cause over the years. He [told the media](https://www.mancity.com/citytv/mens/pep-guardiola-crystal-palace-away-premier-league-reaction-embargo-63869273) that his players must give more. They have no other option. Guardiola explained: “_We have to! The solution is to give me my players back and we will do it. But it’s not possible right now and I think it’s going to happen for a long time. Because we recovered last week the four central defenders, but they passed from the massage table to the pitch, and after the pitch they go back to the massage table again._
_So normally after the table massage, they need tempo, the training a little bit, but the circumstances that we have we could not do it and we demand him a lot, because they come from many years arriving in the last stages of all competitions, so the rest is few. And at the end, there are the moments that the body cannot sustain, we try to, because the doctors, the physios especially and everyone is working incredibly this season like never before I have seen._”
Getting players back from injury is Manchester City’s only hope for now. They entered the Crystal Palace game without Rodri, Oscar Bobb, Mateo Kovacic, Nathan Ake, Manuel Akanji and Phil Foden. Jeremy Doku and Jack Grealish also couldn’t play a full 90 minutes at Selhurst Park. That has put an immeasurable strain of City’s fit players. But until City’s players return from injury that is the situation they must overcome. Based on Pep Guardiola’s update it doesn’t appear that an end is in sight to City’s injury crisis just yet. So the world champions must power on starting on Wednesday evening against Juventus.