Pep Guardiola: I have to think about the next Manchester City captain | OneFootball

Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola has admitted there is a decision to be made on who will replace Kyle Walker and Kevin De Bruyne as the future captains of the club.

Walker will leave Manchester City on a permanent basis when he returns from his loan spell at AC Milan, having moved to the Serie A in January after a disastrous few months of form that saw him lose his spot in the starting XI and fall out of favour with Guardiola.

Matheus Nunes, Rico Lewis and Abdukodir Khusanov have collectively shouldered the workload at centre-half since Walker’s mid-season switch, with the Sheffield-born full back certain to depart when he returns to England from Milan.

Manchester City have identified Newcastle United’s Valentino Livramento and Wolves’ Rayan Aït-Nouri as potent replacements for Walker as they eye four to five first-team signings to challenge on all fronts next season.

Kevin De Bruyne was given a brilliant ovation by the travelling Manchester City fans on the final day of the Premier League campaign as goals from Ilkay Gundogan and Erling Haaland secured a 2-0 win against Fulham at Craven Cottage to ensure a third-place league finish.

After withdrawing interest in Bayer Leverkusen’s Florian Wirtz – who is likely to join newly-crowned Premier League champions Liverpool despite interest from Bayer Munich – Manchester City are targeting the acquisitions of Nottingham Forest’s Morgan Gibbs-White and AC Milan’s Tijjani Reijnders.

Rodri made his long-awaited return to action in last week’s 3-1 win against Bournemouth and is amongst the candidates to take over the armband when Walker and De Bruyne leave in the coming months.

Ruben Dias has been a captain figure since day one after arriving from Benfica in 2020 and is widely expected to be named club captain ahead of the 2025-26 season. City are due to travel to the United States in a few weeks’ time to participate in the FIFA Club World Cup.

Speaking in a press conference after Sunday’s win in west London, Guardiola was asked about the process to decide the next Manchester City captain. “I have to reflect, I have to think about it, yeah,” said the Catalan when asked if he will leave it to his players to vote and select a new skipper.

On whether he will have a say in the screening process, Guardiola added: “No, no, no, no, no, no, I don’t say that.

“I’m thinking I’m going to do in the future, yeah, but I didn’t take the decision, you (addressing a journalist in the press conference) will know it, you are a smart journalist and you will know behind the scenes.

“So we will do it, we have time, so it’s not important at all. We have really, really good captains right now; really, really good ones.”