Manchester City v Blackburn R:PATRICK VIEIRA'S career at Manchester City has begun with a false start. The French midfielder has been ruled out of tonight's Premier League game against Blackburn Rovers because of injury.
Roberto Mancini’s first signing is struggling with a calf problem, despite passing a medical examination from City’s fitness staff on Thursday. His first game back in English football after a four-and-a-half-year absence is now likely to be at Everton on Saturday.
Vieira has been struggling with the injury since taking a kick in his last appearance for Internazionale, in a 1-0 victory over Chievo last Wednesday. The former Arsenal midfielder was unable to train fully with the rest of his new team-mates yesterday and was restricted to light work in the gymnasium. He has undergone a scan and City’s doctors have told Mancini that it would be too risky to play him against Blackburn.
Vieira had been due to go straight into the team – probably at the expense of either Nigel de Jong or Gareth Barry – and possibly to take over as captain, given that Kolo Toure is at the Africa Cup of Nations with Ivory Coast and City’s vice-captain, Stephen Ireland, is out of action with a hamstring strain.
Instead he has joined an extensive injury list that includes Roque Santa Cruz, Joleon Lescott and Wayne Bridge and missed an opportunity to show that he can be as influential as he was when he was the fulcrum of Arsène Wenger’s title-winning Arsenal sides.
Vieira was particularly keen to stress at his introductory press conference last Friday he was not on the wane after two of his former Arsenal team-mates, Nigel Winterburn and Lee Dixon, expressed misgivings about the longevity of a man who won three Premier League titles while at Highbury. Dixon was particularly sceptical about whether a player who will turn 34 in June would be able to play every week.
“Patrick gets a few little niggles and hasn’t got a classically fit footballer’s body, where you know he’s an athlete who can go on and on,” he said. “He always needed a long time to recover after games, longer than some of the older lads.”
Mancini, meanwhile, has laughed off talk he tried to recruit Argentina midfielder Juan Sebastian Veron to his Eastlands squad.
The Italian tactician revealed how an innocent phone call to his former team-mate and former Manchester United man, was at the root of the story.
But Mancini is adamant that Veron, now 34 and back in Argentina as skipper of his first club Estudiantes, was never in his list of January targets.
Mancini told the club’s website: “Veron is my friend. I played with him at Sampdoria and at Lazio, and when I was the manager at Inter he played for me.
“I called him just to say hello and as we talked I joked with Seba, ‘If you want, you can come to play for City’, but I was only joking and he knew that.
“He plays for Estudiantes and is very happy there. It was never a possibility for us.”
Blackburn manager Sam Allardyce only has doubts over Vince Grella (thigh) after Brett Emerton was passed fit.
El-Hadji Diouf is suspended following his sending off against Aston Villa.
It is now eight matches since Blackburn last won in the league, leaving Allardyce describing January as a “make or break” month for his side.
