Rodri

Born in Madrid in June 1996, Rodri spent six years in Atlético Madrid's youth system before being released. He rebuilt his career at Villarreal, broke into their first team, and did enough there that Atlético bought him back in 2018 for around €20 million — an unusually literal case of a club paying to correct its own judgement.

Manchester City signed him in the summer of 2019 for roughly €70 million, a club-record fee at the time. He became the pivot the rest of Pep Guardiola's side was arranged around, collecting four successive Premier League titles and the 2023 Champions League — a final he settled himself, scoring the only goal against Inter Milan to complete City's treble.

The peak came in 2024. He won Euro 2024 with Spain, their first major trophy in twelve years, and then the Ballon d'Or, becoming the first Manchester City player in the club's history to win it.

Rodri is a holding midfielder in the most structural sense of the term — the number six a whole system is designed outward from rather than a destroyer who sits in front of the defence. At 190cm he is physically imposing, but his value has never really been about duels won.

It is about what happens when he receives the ball under pressure: he keeps it, and in keeping it he sets the tempo the team plays at. That is why his absences read so strangely in the data. City do not obviously lose goals without him; they lose control, which shows up a week later in a game they should have been managing and were not.

Rodri is scheduled for back surgery, confirmed by Enzo Maresca — City's new manager following Pep Guardiola's departure — with no firm return date given. It lands immediately after the best month of his career.

It also continues a pattern. Since the knee injury he has not had a clean run: he managed 17 starts in 38 Premier League matches last season, with a groin problem at the Club World Cup, knee tendinopathy in pre-season and a hamstring injury on top. His contract runs to June 2027, and he has been open about wanting to play in Spain again at some point, which has kept Real Madrid attached to his name.