Manchester City striker Wilfried Bony vows to get back scoring and reveals how music kept him going through injury heartache
Ivory Coast star can reel off his setbacks as quickly as he can describe his goals and is keen to remain in the Premier League
A COMPLETE season free of injury will be music to Wilfried Bony’s ears.
The Manchester City striker can reel off the setbacks as quickly as describing his goals.
He remembers in detail the form that made him the Premier League’s top scorer in 2014, most of his strikes instinctive, one-touch finishes.
Then came the fitness and health problems.
When City team-mate Vincent Kompany crocks you in training, you know it is a run of awful luck.
Bony has been in a recording studio helping young musical talent but he is desperate to get back on song in front of goal.
He said: “When I was at City, I never passed one month without an injury.
“There was always something. I had never been injured like this since I started playing football. Never. It was a bad moment.
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“It was malaria first, which is why I did not go to Indonesia with the team in pre-season.
“I trained and was first in Marbella with my personal coach.
“We realised I had malaria so we couldn’t train how we wanted. Then we came to the UK and the tests showed everything had gone but I didn’t go to Indonesia as it was too hot there and they said maybe I could get it again.
“So I stayed and continued training with the second team.
“When the team returned, we went to Germany to play against Stuttgart and there my finger was broken.
“They asked me if I wanted an operation but I said ‘no’ as the season was starting in two weeks. So I played all season with it. That season my body was suffering, then it was complicated for me to stay.
“There was the hamstring against Juventus. Against Barca I had a foot broken.
“I got caught by my own player in training, Vincent!
“This is football, there are ups and downs and I believe I have passed my difficult time.”
Bony was injured — and lonely — when he first joined Dutch outfit Vitesse Arnhem from Czechs Sparta Prague earlier in his career.
But the switch from Swansea — where he hit those 18 league goals in 2014 — to City was new territory, as a big-money Prem ace with a £28million price-tag on his head.
He says music helped him through the bad times, which is why he has just launched his project to help budding artists.
When Pep Guardiola arrived at the Etihad as boss last summer, Bony was told his chances would be limited, so the Ivory Coast star looked for a loan move — ending up up Stoke.
He said: “Before I left he told me he was not pushing me outside but ‘you need to play games with your profile, the way you play’.
“He said, ‘I like the way you play but I play with one striker and there are not many games where I will play two, so it will be difficult for you to play all season. And after the last season with injuries and not a lot of rhythm, you need to play’.
“That was the last conversation.”
The move to Stoke did not work out, with Bony frustrated at being frozen out by Mark Hughes.
The 28-year-old has a clause in his contract allowing him to leave for the mega-money on offer in China, but he wants to stay in the Premier League.
Bony explained: “I like English football, I like the country and it is my way to play.
“My family like the country and do not want to move. And me especially, I don’t want to move.
“It is the best league and I am here because I’ve been successful here and want to be in the future.”
Clubs have been monitoring his situation at City but he is set to start pre-season at that Etihad Campus at the start of next week.
Before then, Bony has his own training regime to get him ready for the new campaign.
He said: “I’m off to Mirano in Italy for detox.
“Then I will train with my personal trainer Olivier Guillier. Then after a week I go to Le Mans in France to follow my training before going to City on July 10. He knows my profile. I’m a penalty-box player. Good over five or ten metres. Explosive.
“I have a good jump. I’m good in front of goal, reading the ball and reading the defence.”
Bony was speaking at Oscillate Recordings in Knutsford, near Manchester, after launching plans for his own record label to support youngsters in the Afrobeat scene.
Getting back fit and scoring goals would be hard to beat as he aims to put his frustrations behind him.
And he pointed to the struggles of Angel Di Maria at neighbours Manchester United as proof that you can get back to where you once were.
He said: “Look at Di Maria. He came here and was struggling. He went to Paris and he is playing well.
“Falcao, the same. You see Romelu Lukaku.
“He was struggling at Chelsea and now maybe they want him back. Kevin De Bruyne. Anything is possible.
“I am always confident and positive, I know my strengths and nobody pushes me away from that.
“Just because I’m in difficult times, it doesn’t mean I don’t know how to play football or to score. If I score a lot of goals next season, we will forget about all of that.”
Interview courtesy of NVA Entertainment Group.
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