Manchester City striker Erling Haaland may turn into probably the most prolific goalscorer of all time within the Premier League however his position within the workforce is being re-evaluated after a passive efficiency in Saturday’s 2-1 defeat by Manchester United.
Haaland had little affect in City’s recreation within the derby, taking solely 19 touches and registering solely two pictures, neither of which hit the goal.
His efficiency at Old Trafford was a stark distinction when he scored three targets and supplied two assists in a 6–3 defeat to United in October, taking 35 touches and 6 pictures.
City coach Pep Guardiola admitted his concern about Haaland’s involvement after a defeat that left City eight factors behind Premier League leaders Arsenal after dropping eight of their final 5 video games.
“He had enough touches but it is true that when you are looking at areas and you have to look at them,” Guardiola mentioned, “we have to find them a little bit more.”
The Norwegian striker has scored 21 league targets earlier than the midway stage of the league marketing campaign, two shy of equaling the 23 targets joint prime scorers Son Heung-min and Mohamed Salah managed within the entirety of final season.
He is effectively on observe to interrupt the league report of 32 targets in a 38-game season set by Salah in 2017-18. He can also be inside attain of turning into the primary participant since Chelsea’s Jimmy Greaves in 1960–61 to attain 41 targets in an English top-flight marketing campaign.
However, his large objective seems to have come on the expense of City’s total play. After 18 matches he has 39 factors, 5 lower than on the identical stage final season, whereas he has scored double the quantity of targets, though he has scored two extra.
Haaland’s arrival has additionally meant that the remainder of the workforce have scored fewer targets. City’s different prime scorer is Phil Foden on seven, with Julian Alvarez and Kevin De Bruyne subsequent on three every.
Last season, when City overtook Liverpool for the title, De Bruyne was the workforce’s prime scorer with 15 league targets, whereas Raheem Sterling scored 13 and Riyad Mahrez 11. Eight gamers scored seven or extra targets.
After the derby, former midfielder Dietmar Hamann claimed that City had been “a better team without Haaland, even if he scores 40 goals this season”.
However, Guardiola insisted that his workforce was nonetheless taking part in the way in which he needed. “I would say the discrepancy was in terms of results, not performance,” he mentioned.
With inputs from TheIndianEXPRESS
