Despite being one of only two fit senior centre backs at the club, Nicolas Otamendi is third in the pecking order at Manchester City at the moment.
The 31-year-old Argentine has cut a frustrated figure of late. Aside from a very brief substitute cameo against Southampton, his role has been limited to only the EFL Cup and Champions League since a disastrous display against Wolves in October.
Rumours circulated at the back end of last season that Otamendi was unhappy with his fringe role behind Vincent Kompany, Aymeric Laporte and John Stones and wanted to leave the Etihad, but however much truth lied within such talk, he ultimately stayed.
After Kompany left for a role at Anderlecht, it seemed Otamendi would share the workload with Laporte and Stones, but the season has not panned out smoothly thus far.
Laporte suffered a serious injury against Brighton in City’s fourth league game of the season, while John Stones missed large chunks of September and October with issues of his own.
If ever there was a time for a senior centre back to step up to the plate it came in September, gift-wrapped. Otamendi partnered Fernandinho in a makeshift defensive unit, with mixed results. Despite wins over Watford, Everton and Dinamo Zagreb, the unit was not ultimately convincing.
The 2-0 home loss to Wolves on October 6th proved to be the nail in his coffin. In a game City dominated without scoring, dreadful defending from Otamendi enabled Raul Jimenez to set up Adama Traore for the first of two late goals which saw City fall further behind early Premier League pacesetters, Liverpool.
With John Stones still injured the following weekend for the trip to Crystal Palace, Pep Guardiola made a bold statement and dropped Otamendi completely, deploying Fernandinho and Rodri at centre back with young Spaniard Erick Garcia joining the returning Stones on the bench.
Since then, Stones has formed a settled partnership with Fernandinho, with Otamendi relegated to a role in the cup competitions. Having started the season as one of three senior centre backs, when Aymeric Laporte returns in 2020, it is likely he will fall down to fourth choice.
None of this can come as too much of a surprise. Otamendi is 31-years-old and few centre backs are able to operate at the top of the game much older than that.
The problem that City face is that he is contracted until 2022. While it seems obvious that City will look to sign a defender either in January or the coming summer, the Citizens have fallen into a situation where they are set to pay £120,000 every week to a player who is already looking past his best, for other two-and-a-half years.
