Description:

What issue is being seen? Describe what should be happening instead of
the bug, for example: The expected value isn't returned, etc.

Noticed envoy-proxy pods were not starting

Conditions:
  Type           Status  Reason
  ----           ------  ------
  Available      False   MinimumReplicasUnavailable
  Progressing    True    ReplicaSetUpdated

in the envoy gateway logs, I noticed topology injector failures

2025-05-01T15:58:03.840Z	ERROR	provider	kubernetes/topology_injector.go:78	error decoding patch: unexpected end of JSON inputpatch pod failedpodenvoy-gateway-system/envoy-default-eg-e41e7b31-654ccf5f87-mw6hk	{"runner": "provider"}

Repro steps:

Include sample requests, environment, etc. All data and inputs
required to reproduce the bug.

Note: If there are privacy concerns, sanitize the data prior to
sharing.

Environment:

Include the environment like gateway version, envoy version and so on.

Logs:

Include the access logs and the Envoy logs.