Pep Guardiola has told John Stones he needs him on the pitch in Wednesday’s crunch Champions League clash with Bruges.
The England defender has made only eight starts for Manchester City this season in an injury-hit campaign and not completed 90 minutes since October.
He made just one appearance between mid-November and mid-January due to foot problems but has come off the bench in the last two matches.
With fellow centre-backs Nathan Ake and Ruben Dias out and new signing Abdokodir Khusanov ineligible, City boss Guardiola now wants Stones to step up.
City must beat the Belgian side at the Etihad Stadium to avoid elimination from European competition, having slumped to 25th in the league-phase table following a dramatic capitulation at Paris St Germain last week.
Guardiola said: “Listen, he has to play – unless he says to me that he promises he (really) cannot play and after that Josko (Gvardiol) will be central defender and I will invent who plays full-back.
“But the reality is he can play, with Josko left-back and Matheus (Nunes), who is getting better each game in terms of speed and concentration (at right-back). It’s massively important, our game on Wednesday.”
City have been hampered by injuries all season, the most significant of which has seen midfield linchpin Rodri ruled out for the majority of the campaign.
With veteran right-back Kyle Walker having also left, the club brought forward summer spending plans to sign defenders Khusanov and Vitor Reis, and forward Omar Marmoush this month.
Khusanov, 20, was pressed into immediate action against Chelsea on Saturday and endured a torrid debut.
Guardiola said: “Khusanov shouldn’t have played. It should take time.
“It’s not easy, Chelsea in the Premier League and he’s come from another country, not communicating much with his team-mates having arrived with no training sessions on what we want to do or the process we have.
“Imagine all of us living what happened to Khusanov? It would be, ‘Oh, God’.
“But the situation is that Ruben and Nathan are not there and we’re lucky that Manu (Akanji) stayed (fit).
“The problems continue but John can help us for our ‘final’ on Wednesday.”
Stones excelled in a defence-midfield hybrid role during City’s treble-winning campaign of 2022-23, but Guardiola says reprising that is out of the question for now. The priority is just to get him playing again.
He said: “Now with John, I’m struggling to see it, due to injuries, that he plays there.
“I prefer to see him back as a defender, especially reading situations, where he is so, so good.
“I have no doubts on John or even Nathan but they have not been here. And last season they have not been here either, so this is the problem.
“I wouldn’t like to go to the market in this period but we have a lot of examples of (players) not being able to go every three days.”
