Which games will Rico Lewis miss after FIFA Club World Cup opener suspension? | OneFootball

Rico Lewis was shown a straight red card in Manchester City’s 2-0 victory over Wydad AC in their opening fixture of the FIFA Club World Cup on Wednesday.

The 20-year-old was controversially sent off after 88 minutes for a two-footed challenge where he clearly won the ball, much to the dismay of the England international and manager Pep Guardiola.

City were reduced to ten men in the closing minutes of the group-stage tie but cruised to a comfortable win, with Phil Foden and Jeremy Doku on the scoresheet for Guardiola’s side in Philadelphia.

Manchester City are aiming to go all the way in the Club World Cup for a multitude of reasons, with a significant financial prize on offer for the eventual champions as well as a timely chance to boost morale in the dressing room after a difficult 2024-25 season.

Guardiola has been given a crucial injection of fresh blood by the Manchester City board, with newly-appointed director of football Hugo Viana heavily involved in the acquisition of Rayan Ait-Nouri, Marcus Bettinelli, Tijjani Reijnders and Rayan Cherki.

The quartet were signed in the first 10 days of June, registered in time to be eligible to feature at the Club World Cup. Kyle Walker, Kalvin Phillips and Jack Grealish have all been left out of the competition squad.

City comfortably secured the three points in their opening group-stage fixture as Reijnders and Cherki were named in the starting XI, whilst Ait-Nouri did not come off the bench and Bettinelli was excluded from the matchday squad altogether.

After Foden and Doku put City in the driver’s seat against Wydad AC in the first-half, the second half was much more calm but the closing minutes drew some controversy when Lewis was questionably sent off for what replays have shown was a fair challenge from the Manchester City academy graduate.

Lewis will miss Manchester City’s upcoming Club World Cup clash against Al Ain, though the defender’s absence is unlikely to hamper Guardiola’s selection plans as such because the Catalan has admitted to be planning to change his lineup entirely for next week’s game.

A one-game suspension means Lewis will be in contention to return to the starting XI against Juventus in City’s third group-stage tie, which is likely to decide where the Blues will finish in the group.

City can secure qualification to the knockout stages of the Club World Cup with victory over Al Ain and Guardiola is set to name a completely different starting XI to the one he put out in the opening win over Wydad AC.

Guardiola has sympathised with Lewis over the latter’s controversial sending-off and the Manchester City manager will not hold the incident against the young full-back, who has impressed since breaking into the first-team midway through the treble-winning 2022-23 campaign.