Erling Haaland missed nine opportunities to score as Manchester City and Chelsea drew, but despite the Norwegian’s poor performance, Pep Guardiola still supports him wholeheartedly.
Erling Haaland tied an undesirable club record, and Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola assured the striker would score in his team’s next encounter.
Haaland had a terrible night playing against Chelsea, and City lost the Premier League title match. The Norwegian had nine attempts at the Chelsea goal, but he missed them all handily. He so became the first City player to miss the net on that many attempts since Sergio Aguero in 2017. With 1.71 goals, he also had his highest number of Expected Goals without a goal.
Haaland, who is still among the best attackers in the Premier League, has only scored twice in his previous six top-flight games, both of which came in the victory against Everton last week.
As he departed the Etihad Stadium field on Saturday, he aggressively pushed away a camera in response to his challenging evening. Guardiola, nevertheless, is certain that the underperforming striker will soon find success again.
He got nine shots, which is good. He will score the next time. I played football for eleven years and scored eleven goals. How about that statistic? My numbers are one goal per season,” the City manager stated.
Therefore, I’m not a suitable individual to counsel the striker on what to do. He had the opportunity, we created it, and he will score in the following game. Indeed [I think that]. He’s a human, this is football.
“That’s not my fault… It’s football, and it’s people. We simply did not play at our best in the first half as a team or as a bunch. We should have won based on the way we played. With the opportunities we had, I’m positive that we deserved it.
“They had their opportunities throughout the transition, and the first half was close. Even though our dynamic was off, we still had two or three good opportunities. But when we scored a goal, we got into the game. Raheem’s goal prompted us to respond, and our play and execution in the second half were excellent.”
Former Chelsea and City player Daniel Sturridge thinks Haaland will be troubled by the opportunities he lost. He expects the Norwegian to be depressed, but he needs to get himself back up.
When he gets home, he will undoubtedly reflect on his performance and ask himself, “What could I have done better?” A player comparable to him, who enters the field expecting to score goals,
“He’s going to be depressed about himself because he feels like he could have won the game for his team tonight. However, it is a striker’s life. There are days like this when nothing goes according to plan.
It is your responsibility to set the objectives. That burden falls on Haaland’s shoulders. Even though the objectives are unclear, he is aware of why he was brought here, his talent level, and his expectations for himself.”
