Leroy Sane is hopeful he could make his return from a serious knee injury before the end of the season after undergoing surgery.
The Germany international underwent an operation this week to repair his damaged anterior cruciate ligament, opting to go with Professor Christian Fink to perform the surgery, rather than City’s preferred choice.
Surgeon Dr Ramon Cugat in Barcelona has operated on several of City’s top stars, including Kevin de Bruyne and Benjamin Mendy, but on the advice of his Germany team mates, Sane went for Fink.
Austria is viewed as one of the top places to go for treatment for ACL injuries, building up a good reputation in the snowboarding and skiing worlds.
However, the decision to snub Dr Cugat has not gone down well with City boss Pep Guardiola.
With the surgery having gone to plan, Sane has now set out on the long road to recovery and is optimistic at his recovery time-frame.
Having initially been ruled out for the season when he went down with the injury in the Community Shield at the start of the month, the Sun are now reporting that he could be back in action sooner than expected.
The 23-year-old is refusing to put a time frame on his recovery and hopes he could make his comeback towards the end of City’s season.
Sane is desperate to prove is fitness before Germany coach Joachim Lowe names his squad for Euro 2020 and will be pushing himself to get back on the pitch as soon as possible.
Sane has turned his attention towards returning to full fitness having spent the majority of the summer being linked with Bayern Munich.
The German champions are thought to have made several unsuccessful bids for the forward but were knocked back by their English counterparts, who slapped a £135million price tag on his head.
Bayern were thought to be preparing yet another offer before Sane went down with injury and have since signed Philippe Coutinho on loan from Barcelona with the option to make his stay permanent come the end of the season.
The Bundesliga side have also brought in Ivan Perisic on loan from Inter Milan so might not renew their interest in Sane.
That will please City, who had been working on an extension for Sane before Bayern Munich registered their interest.
Sane is understood to be unhappy with how Pep Guardiola has used him since he took charge at the Etihad Stadium, often bringing him off the bench during City’s title-winning campaign.
