MANCHESTER -- Manuel Pellegrini revealed he is unhappy that Manchester City have to release Yaya Toure for the African Nations Cup and suggested the midfielder will probably go before their Jan. 10 meeting with Everton.
And while Frank Lampard's loan spell at the Etihad Stadium, which Pellegrini is keen to extend, is due to expire at the end of 2014, the Chilean said the veteran was brought to City partly because they hoped he would be able to provide cover when Toure was away representing Ivory Coast.
The 31-year-old's last game is expected to be the FA Cup tie against Sheffield Wednesday and the African Nations Cup lasts until Feb. 8.
Pellegrini said in a news conference that he is irritated to be losing Toure, who has scored five goals in his last eight games.
"Happy? No," he stated. "You always want to retain the best players here but you know the rules.
"He will go around Jan. 5-10. We are not exactly sure of the dates. I think he will play in the FA Cup and then go in the second week of January.
"I think maybe the FA Cup game will be the last one. They start playing on different dates, the teams in the African Cup of Nations, so we will see.
"I think with every club, you know at the start of the season what will happen. You have FIFA dates, African Cup of Nations, American cups. You can prepare the season knowing those things and you can do it in the way you think is best."
Lampard has scored six goals since joining on loan from New York City FC and Pellegrini said City were already planning for the second half of the campaign when they brought him in on an initial four-month loan.
"One of the reasons we asked him to play here was because we knew Yaya would be leaving us to go to the African Cup of Nations," he said.
City are yet to announce if Lampard will remain in Manchester and Pellegrini added: "I'm confident he'll stay but I can't say 100 percent because it doesn't depend just on me.
"It's not so easy because Frank is a New York City player. He's only on loan until December so we must respect the other people."