Manchester City fear that Mateo Kovacic could be out until October with the Achilles injury that he had surgery on this summer.

Kovacic went under the knife shortly after the season finished, missing the Club World Cup and the rest of pre-season with the hope that he would be able to be fit around the start of the new campaign.

The Croatian has travelled with the group to Palermo for their last friendly before their first Premier League game, but it is thought that he will still be out for a considerable length of time with concerns that he may stay sidelined until October.

That would add to City's problems in defensive midfield for the first few months of the campaign, with Pep Guardiola having already declared that Rodri will not be fully fit until after the first internationa

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