Eric Garcia is set to be given more first-team opportunities next season after impressing Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola .
The 18-year-old ended a decade in the Barcelona academy to move to the Etihad in 2017 , and turned in a string of impressive performances on the pre-season tour last summer when a number of senior centre-backs were absent.
After missing the first part of last season with injury, the teenager was thrown straight into the starting XI for the Carabao Cup quarter-final at Leicester in December; after City's win on penalties, Guardiola praised the "huge personality" that he played with on the pitch.
Further starts in both legs of the semi-final followed, and he could benefit from City's transfer activity this summer .
Aymeric Laporte and John Stones aren't going anywhere but Vincent Kompany's departure for Anderlecht leaves an opening in central defence and Nicolas Otamendi is not certain to stay at the club. Even if City do sign a centre-back as expected, Garcia has done enough to come more into Guardiola's plans for next season.
The Spanish centre-back earned the manager's praise for his attitude as well as his ability.
“I'm incredibly satisfied for not just the game but the way he is training, his behaviour, how polite he is, how he listens. When he has doubts, he asks myself or our staff," he said earlier in the season.
“He's so smart, so intelligent. His physicality is not so, so strong, but he resolved the situation by thinking.
“I like to work with smart people, intelligent people. He is one of them.”
