Pep Guardiola and Manchester City struck with major travel delay affecting Sporting CP preparations

Manchester City’s preparations for their UEFA Champions League clash against Sporting CP have been struck by travel delays on Monday evening.

The Premier League champions are headed for the Portuguese capital of Lisbon this week in their third of four consecutive matches away from home, and City will be hoping for a much more positive outcome compared to their opening two away visits.

An exit from the Carabao Cup fourth round clash came first midway through last week as Tottenham inflicted a 2-1 defeat on Pep Guardiola’s side, before the same scoreline in favour of Bournemouth would follow in Premier League action on Saturday afternoon.

Manchester City’s last Champions League outing brought about a much more positive scoreline as they comfortably dismissed of Sparta Prague at the Etihad Stadium in a 5-0 win that featured an Erling Haaland brace.

But as City look to get themselves back on the victory trail, their preparations before their meeting with Ruben Amorim’s Portuguese champions have been impacted by travel delays as a result of bad weather conditions.

That is according to the information of the Manchester Evening News’ Simon Bajkowski, who reports that Manchester City have tonight been forced to land in Lisbon later than they had originally wanted due to stormy weather in and around the Portuguese capital.

It is explained that heavy rainfall in Lisbon across Monday caused problems in the air, forcing Manchester City to push back their media duties at Estádio José Alvalade by around an hour on Monday night.

City’s staff, players, and club delegation were originally expected to conduct media activity involving Pep Guardiola and Bernardo Silva around 19:10 in the evening.

On board Manchester City’s flight to Lisbon on Monday night is a 22-man travelling squad for the contest 24 hours later, featuring a number of players who have recently returned to matchday action following injury.

There have not been any changes from the City squad that visited Bournemouth however, with the likes of Kyle Walker, Manuel Akanji, Kevin De Bruyne, Savinho, and Jeremy Doku remaining present for the trip to Lisbon in the Champions League.

However, five players remain absent through injury and fitness problems alongside Oscar Bobb and Rodri’s lengthy lay-offs, with Ruben Dias and John Stones likely ruled out until after the international break with Jack Grealish.