Ultimately, it was all about Erling Haaland, just as the gods of the story intended.
He scored the winner against his former club, but it was long thought Borussia Dortmund would be shocked city of manchester Wednesday in the Champions League was the second most high-profile reunion in the competition. It took Man 80 minutes before his City had his first shot, but two very different and brilliant goals saw him win 2–1, his second in his two games in the group stage. won the victory.
Edin Teržić will probably regret replacing centre-forward Anthony Modest with centre-back Nico Schlotterbeck. Nevertheless, Haaland scored in the 84th minute until a ferocious strike from John Stones leveled City level in the 80th minute. Perhaps João Cancelo shouldn’t have been given as much time as he was, but given the opportunity, he made a perfect cross on the outside of his right foot and Haaland finished with an acrobatic, controlled head-high volley. He may not have celebrated out of respect for the old club, but it was a moment worth savoring.
Haaland’s start at Man City was impressive. In six league games he scored ten goals and last week in the Champions League he scored twice in the 4-0 win against Sevilla. He has scored his 26 goals in his 21 league appearances in the Champions League and is still 22 years old.
In terms of chances, the first half was largely eventless and it took 20 minutes of the second half before City started to move, by which time they were behind Jude Bellingham’s header. Dull patches aren’t completely unknown due to their low urgency to score 3 points. I must have been worried.
On off days, City could be a team that wastes chance after chance. The Stones’ goal was City’s first attempt on target. Occasionally Haaland threatened to make something for Jack Grealish to cut in from the left, but his efforts to move the ball to his right foot were predictable enough and blocked.
But by and large, the City was slow and ponderous. Dortmund, of course, deserve credit for the way Mats Hummels handled Haaland, backed by a midfield so deeply depressed and denying City creative space, but this was also about City. .
When Haaland missed two decent chances in the 3-1 loss to Liverpool in the Community Shield, there were many questions about whether he could do as well in England as he did in Austria and Germany before. There are a lot of players out there with great goalscoring records from the Bundesliga who are struggling to score in the Premier League.
But the problem wasn’t really Harland. He’s a phenomenon, essentially unstoppable when he runs into a defender, almost impossible to beat a muscle against, and he’s also an excellent leader in the game with a tremendous ability to finish first. recently said he thinks Kylian Mbappe is the better footballer, but that’s because of his versatility, and there’s probably something to it.
But Harland doesn’t care. He’s like a creature brought to life in a midnight tower in a storm, the result of a dangerous experiment to create the perfect goalscorer. If he has any ancestry, they are rare: Brazilian Ronaldo, presumably before injury, Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Eduardo Streltsov and Bernabe Ferreira, who were all surprisingly strong forwards and who excelled at it. It was associated with technical prowess.
Haaland scores the winning goal between Manchester City and Borussia Dortmund.
Darren Staples/Sports Images/Imago Images
The question was whether he could fit into Pep Guardiola’s system. Much of Guardiola’s success over the last 14 years has been down to how his team has controlled the game. He says the team needs to have 15 passes to set themselves up to be able to attack without being counter-attacked. increase. COMMUNITY What was impressive about his Shield loss was how many times he made dangerous runs with no passes coming.
It was quickly fixed in the opening weekend against West Ham. But Haaland has scored, suggesting he could break the Premier League scoring record, but City are open. A two-down draw against Newcastle, then Crystal he fought back to two downs (he would have been three downs if it weren’t for the embarrassing disallowed effort) to take the win against Palace. I was. The draw at Villa could be the result of this he tried to reconcile the two.
Schlotterbeck severely downplayed Haaland and the difference he could make in an instant when he told the German media: We have to stop them all (Manchester City). Erling is the least of our problems. “
How untrue it turned out to be.
When it comes to City, getting the balance right will be key to ultimately winning the Champions League this season, but this victory, unlike previous iterations, has shown that even poor play is enough to make a game. We have proven that we can win. Harland gives us the possibility to avoid disappointing overall performance.
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