Paul Robinson believes Manchester City aren’t as efficient when Erling Haaland is in the starting eleven and told Football Insider that they’re ‘struggling’ in games of late – similar criticism that Dietmar Hamann made.
Robinson says the 22-year-old was ‘nullified’ in City’s 4-2 win over Tottenham Hotspur and claims the Sky Blues don’t know how to score without him. He said: “It looks like they’re struggling to score when Haaland’s in the team. Haaland was nullified (against United) and largely quiet (against Tottenham).”
It’s worth noting that City have scored the same amount of goals after 19 games (50) as they did last season, but they’re averaging less shots per game (16.9) and one of their players has considerably more chances (3.9 per game) than others.
Haaland has 22 goals from 70 shots this campaign – 6.5 more goals than his expected goals tally too – so City are relying on his magic to get results. He’s having a quarter of City’s chances in a game and has scored nearly half their goals, so it’s little wonder every defeat has come in a match he didn’t score in.
Guardiola’s men aren’t pulling their weight and Robinson is right to be critical. Hamann felt the same way. City didn’t have just one individual who could score in every game last season. They had others to pick up the slack – eight players scored seven or more league goals in 2021/22. So Pep needs more goals from the supporting cast.
In other news, Jamie Carragher critical of Kyle Walker’s recent form
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