Joe Hart’s future at Manchester City is looking increasingly shaky after he was left out of the opening day win over Sunderland.
Last season’s Capital One Cup final hero Willy Caballero took his place between the sticks and while he didn’t have an awful lot to do, Pep Guardiola’s decision essentially paid off because City avoided the potential banana skin with three points.
Goal.com understand that the England number one now fears his time at the club is up, with Guardiola reportedly eyeing Barcelona’s substitute goalkeeper Claudio Bravo.
It was always expected that the new man in the hot seat might dip into his former club this transfer window, but this has still come as a surprise.
Quite why he has dropped Hart is unclear. The stopper had a shocking Euro 2016, making key mistakes against both Wales and Iceland. For City, however, his form was generally pretty consistent last season.
Of course, it’s possible Guardiola just wants to assert his authority and Hart is an unfortunate victim of that.
Guardiola has insisted it is not too late for the 29-year-old to force his way back into the first team, but if Bravo arrives, it’s going to be very difficult for him to do that.
Everton and Sevilla are both monitoring the situation, with City understood to want £20million for their title-winning goalkeeper.
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