With 16 Manchester City players representing their countries at the 2022 World Cup, it's difficult to predict how the tournament in Qatar will impact the rest of City's season.
There will be players hoping their performances convince Pep Guardiola to give them more starts, while others will be hoping to use their excellent club form to carry their nations to glory. For Sergio Gomez though, the situation is a little different.
City's young left-back was not included in Spain's World Cup squad, but he can still use Qatar 2022 to his advantage. The 22-year-old will use the season pause to recuperate and then work hard to persuade his manager that he deserves a place in the starting XI.
When City announced the signing of Gomez from Anderlecht for £11m plus add-ons back in August, it was made clear that he would be considered a player for the future. Because of that, there was an expectation that he would be sent out on loan, but Guardiola soon decided that the left-back already had sufficient quality and experience to take a place in his squad.
With Kyle Walker and Joao Cancelo City's first-choice full-backs, Gomez was never expected to feature too much. Yet when he did get the chance to play early in the season he impressed, particularly when he replaced Walker during City's 6-3 thrashing of Manchester United at the beginning of October.
However, when a needless sending-off away at FC Copenhagen put his teammates in a tricky situation for over an hour, Guardiola seemed to lose a little trust in the youngster.
Following Walker's injury that kept him out of action up until the World Cup, Cancelo and Gomez were City's only fit senior full-backs. It would have made sense for Cancelo to shift across to the right and Gomez to start on the left, but after that Copenhagen game Guardiola more often than not opted to keep Cancelo at left-back and start John Stones - a centre-back - on the right.
Gomez appeared in just two of the seven games he was available for following his red card in Denmark. Those were the Champions League dead-rubber against Sevilla and the Carabao Cup tie against Chelsea in which Guardiola heavily rotated his side. He was not involved at all in City's five league matches running up to the World Cup break.
While there were no-doubt tactical reasons for Guardiola's decision - Cancelo is arguably better on the left than the right and by-and-large, Stones did a good job in an unnatural position - it's hard not to imagine Gomez feeling a little overlooked. After all, City were playing minus one specialised full-back while he was sitting on the bench.
This isn't to say his time at City is doomed, or that he has blown his big chance - far from it. But it will do no harm if while most of his teammates are otherwise engaged in Qatar, he works his socks off to remind Guardiola of the talent at his disposal.
Because there's no doubting the talent of the hard-working and versatile Gomez - his time will almost certainly come. Depending on the condition that players like Cancelo return from the World Cup in, that time could be sooner rather than later.
ManCityFanForever
2
What message that he is playing world cup😂