Man City 4 Southampton 0: Unstoppable Erling Haaland scores 20TH goal of season in tenth successive match
IN the dynamic and deadly world of Erling Haaland, you’d have to put this one down as a quiet day in the office.
But while a solitary strike against Southampton’s whipping boys might seem something of a disappointment after three successive Premier League hat-tricks, consider this.
Haaland’s latest effort takes him to a staggering TWENTY already in a Manchester City shirt, and we’re barely a week into October.
You remember how that always used to be the benchmark for all good centre forwards?
Well he’s torn the rule book up to such an extent that you can forget that talk of 20-goals-a-season strikers. Haaland is not far short of a 20-goals-a-month man.
The big shock was that today’s took 65 minutes to arrive. After he’d missed three chances that, in his book, will go down as sitters as well.
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First he struck the inside of the post with a crisply struck – he rarely does another other kind – first timer when Phil Foden picked him out.
Then he somehow failed to connect from just eight yards as Joao Cancelo drilled a low ball across the box.
And then Southampton keeper Gavin Bazunu made his own tell-the-grandkids memory by diving to paw the ball off Haaland’s boot as he stormed through.
When that happened, you wondered if the silver lining for Saints would be in silencing Europe’s deadliest finisher for an afternoon, albeit the game was already lost at 3-0 down.
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But a couple of minutes later Cancelo traded passes with Kevin De Bruyne, bulleted a ball across the danger area and finally Haaland could celebrate. It’s a feeling he knows well.
Mind you, whether Southampton kept him quiet or not, there is too much stardust sprinkled elsewhere in City shirts to doubt what the outcome would be.
Saints boss Ralph Hassenhuttl warned as much when he said they had plenty more to worry about than simply Haaland.
How prophetic it proved, even if it didn’t turn into quite the shooting-fish-in-a-barrel kind of afternoon most had predicted.
When Haaland hit the post you even wondered if Southampton could leave the Etihad with a point again, as they did in both league meetings last year.
We got the answer on 20 minutes, even if the man who did burst the dam was anything but the one you’d have predicted.
Foden was cleaned out on halfway by Kyle Walker-Peters, but not before he had flicked it to the rampaging Cancelo storming down the left.
No player has had more touches in the Premier League than the Portuguese wing-back, who certainly made the most of his next few.
He turned Jack Ward-Prowse inside out, before giving Bazunu no hope with a rocket which flew into the corner. That’s how you do it, Erling!
Southampton DID eventually manage a shot, on the stroke of half time, when Stuart Armstrong’s long ranger whistled over.
By then, though, it was already well and truly game over, as Foden had dinked a second ten minutes after Cancelo’s opener.
Bazunu had done well to deny him when he burst into the box and drilled in another stinging strike. Although in truth he was merely delaying the inevitable by 60 seconds.
That’s how long it took for Kevin De Bruyne to drive forward, and when Haaland’s run took the defence one way, he passed the other and Foden chipped a cute finish over the keeper.
A two-goal gap was a scant indication of City’s dominance. They will have far tougher sessions at the Etihad Training Campus than this. Certainly more competitive ones.
Bazunu had pulled off more than his share of impressive stops, none better than when he flung himself to keep out a Riyad Mahrez thunderbolt when the scores were still level.
And you could hardly point the finger at the Southampton stopper for any of the strikes which did beat him.
Four minutes after the break he was picking another out of his net – and shock, horror, this didn’t come from the dynamite boots of Haaland either.
Instead it was Mahrez, the man Pep Guardiola had warned to raise his game earlier this week, who obeyed the City gaffer’s orders to the letter.
Rodri picked him out beyond the far post with a lofted ball and the Algerian volleyed into the ground and into the far corner.
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Even then, though, it didn’t feel quite right without one from Haaland in there…so thank Heavens he eventually allowed everyone to rest easy.
Yesterday’s took his average to a goal every 47.7 minutes. You wonder how good he’ll end up when he’s finished growing!
See how the action unfolded in our live blog below…