Pep Guardiola has revealed that Vincent Kompany is not mentally ready to start matches for Manchester City after two seasons' worth of rotten luck with injuries.
Kompany was part of Guardiola's travelling party for Wednesday's Champions League encounter with Barcelona but did not make the 18-man matchday squad, leading to speculation that the City club captain had not seen eye-to-eye with Guardiola.
However, the Spaniard told the press, in quotes transcribed by the Daily Mirror, that the centre back was not in the right frame of mind to play a part in the 4-0 defeat at the Camp Nou.
A spate of injuries in the past two years have prevented Kompany from putting a consistent run of games together for City, and Guardiola insisted that he would now be taking Kompany's rehabilitation at the defender's own pace.
He said: What happened in the last two years (with Kompany's injuries), I don't know. We are working on that with the doctors.
So I thought a few weeks ago: 'Maybe Vincent can come back now. With his personality, maybe he can do that.' But one day after the training session here he said, 'I didn't feel like this'.
At this moment, his head is not ready ” after what happened the last two years to keep him out. Vincent was not perfectly fit in Barcelona. Normally he would be on the bench. But in Barcelona he went to the doctors and said, 'I'm not able to play.'
I don't want to put a lot of pressure about how many games we want him to play or set big, big targets. So[he should] just try to train good and after a week of training [with] no injuries, we'll play a game, and after that another one. And, after that, we'll see.
But I think when he's trying to play one game and after another one, he'll take a lot of confidence. Maybe he'll be able to play a few games.�
Guardiola also admitted that he was to blame for City's heavy loss in midweek, and stated that he had got his gameplan wrong by leaving star striker Sergio Aguero on the substitutes' bench.
The Argentina international did not feature from the off in the 1-1 draw with Everton last Saturday - a match he missed a penalty in - after picking up a knock while on international duty.
Despite being passed fit to face Luis Enrique's men, Aguero was only introduced to the action with 11 minutes of Wednesday's contest remaining, and Guardiola said he would hold his hands up at not handing the 28-year-old a starting berth.
Pep Guardiola explains his decision to drop Sergio Aguero from the starting line-up.
[via @SkySports] https://t.co/3BorfJuMYG
He added: My mistake is my mistake. My decision was Sergio. We lost 4-0. The guilty? I'm guilty. If we win in Barcelona, I'm a genius.
Of course Sergio could have played in Barcelona ” he played there with [previous boss] Manuel Pellegrini many times, all the times there, but in that moment this crazy trainer thought [it was the right decision] - but I believed in that.
If you ask me now, 'With Sergio. would it have been completely different?' I don't know. I don't have this quality to know what happen, but I know what happened. When we lose I'm guilty, so I'm responsible. But I have to make the decisions.�
Join the conversation by following Tom Power on twitter!