Enzo Maresca has confirmed Elliot Anderson was suffering from cramp after the midfielder came off injured during Manchester City's 2-1 win over Bournemouth on Sunday.
Marcus Tavernier gave Bournemouth a shock lead at the Etihad, with City struggling to adapt to Maresca's tactics, which included defender Marc Guehi playing in midfield. Guehi equalised late on before Joško Gvardiol scored in injury time to secure all three points for the home side.
Anderson substituted after collision
Anderson, a summer signing, went down during the second half after a collision with Alex Scott. The midfielder, who started every game bar one for England at the World Cup, was able to get to his feet but was quickly replaced by Mateo Kovacic.
The sight of Anderson limping off in his first league game since his record-breaking £116million transfer from Nottingham Forest was not what City fans wanted to see.
Maresca's update
Maresca allayed fears of a serious injury, revealing Anderson was just suffering from cramp due to a lack of pre-season following the World Cup.
'I think it was cramp,' the Italian told reporters after full-time. 'We still have four or five players that are not 100 per cent and he is one of them.'
He later added in his post-match press conference: 'Today we had four or five players that arrived very late, 10 days ago, so for them it's almost still pre-season. 'Erling [Haaland] is one, Elliot, Marc Guehi, Nico O'Reilly, so it's complicated. But they've done a huge effort to help.'
Quick turnaround ahead
City face a quick turnaround with their next game away to Crystal Palace on Friday night. Asked about Anderson's performance against Bournemouth, Maresca added: 'He was very good. Elliot was very good on the ball, very good off the ball.
'I have a good feeling with Elliot that he's going to be better and better. Again, for him this was like pre-season. He arrived 10 days ago but the feeling with him is that he's going to be very good for this club in the future.'
City's midfield is being completely rebuilt this season, with Rodri, Bernardo Silva and Tijjani Reijnders having departed, while shortly before kick-off it was reported that City have agreed an £85.6m deal to sign Lille teenager Ayyoub Bouaddi.
