It is a transfer no-one saw coming 48 hours ago – Manchester City full-back Joao Cancelo has joined Bayern Munich on loan for the rest of the season.
The 28-year-old has played an integral part in the Premier League titles Pep Guardiola’s side have won in the past two seasons, but has fallen out of favour and will move to Germany with an option to join permanently for 70m euro (£61.5m) in the summer.
The Portugal defender, who moved in 2019 from Juventus for £60m, has played more minutes for City than any other defender this season.
Cancelo has played 1,866 minutes across all competitions this season – 68 more than Manuel Akanji, City’s second most-played defender. He has featured in 26 games, and was on track to play a similar level of games as in the past two seasons – 43 and 52.
However, only 256 minutes have been since domestic football returned after the World Cup, with him taken off at half-time at Chelsea. His other two starts were defeats at Manchester United in the Premier League and Southampton in the Carabao Cup.
His dip has coincided with the emergence of 18-year-old Rico Lewis, and Nathan Ake’s improved form.
With no replacement likely in the January window City will be going into the remaining four months of the season with just 19 senior outfield players.