Pep Guardiola distilled a familiar bluntness when asked about Erling Haaland\u2019s recent scoring numbers. \u201cIt\u2019s his job,\u201d he grinned, a line that underlined how routine the striker\u2019s output now looks for the club.<\/p>\n
Haaland has 93 goals in the Premier League from just 103 appearances, a total that moved him past Ole Gunnar Solskj\u00e6r as the competition\u2019s most prolific Norwegian. The brace that produced that mark also propelled him into Manchester City\u2019s list of the club\u2019s 10 all-time top scorers.<\/p>\n
The 25-year-old, who joined City three years ago, has already accumulated 133 goals across all competitions for the club. That sits a little over half of Sergio Ag\u00fcero\u2019s club record of 260, though Haaland\u2019s current Premier League scoring rate suggests the gap will narrow if he maintains this form.<\/p>\n
Guardiola downplayed spectacle in favour of substance, calling Haaland \u201can incredibly important figure for us.\u201d \u201cHe always has the feeling that he can score and I\u2019m really pleased again for the performance for the team,\u201d the manager added, linking individual output to collective progress as City closed ground on a faltering Liverpool.<\/p>\n
Reflecting on the squad\u2019s response after recent matches, the manager said: \u201cSince the [Manchester] United game, the team showed another way in their body language when they weren\u2019t playing good against Arsenal in how they defend and helped each other\u2014that is the key for everything,\u201d Guardiola beamed.<\/p>\n
For all the headlines around Haaland, it was J\u00e9r\u00e9my Doku who drew the most vivid reaction on the night. The winger\u2019s dribbles and combinations left Guardiola openly exclaiming: \u201cWow!\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI ask the wingers in the final third to go one vs. one or one vs. two and I have the feeling that J\u00e9r\u00e9my\u2019s decision-making in the final third improved, like, wow!\u201d Guardiola said, later adding: \u201cComparing to the past, he made an assist to Erling and sees the channels.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Doku\u2019s role against compact defences the manager observed: \u201cHe\u2019s an incredible threat against teams that are a low block and deep,\u201d and added: \u201cJ\u00e9r\u00e9my is really important. When the team is transitional maybe he can struggle a bit but he had the ball and brought the opponent to the box.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Haaland has 93 Premier League goals from 103 appearances; Guardiola: “It’s his job” Doku drew “Wow!”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3166,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[238],"tags":[1019,1068],"class_list":["post-3167","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-manchester-city","tag-creative-players","tag-dominance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3167","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3167"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3167\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3166"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3167"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3167"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3167"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}