sport news Haaland will prove City are lightyears ahead of United in the Manchester derby trends now
There were some very lazy pundits around before Erling Haaland moved to England.
Sceptics emerged again after Liverpool beat Manchester City in the Community Shield.
Haaland wasn’t at his best that day but, as I said at the time, if he plays badly and still has three good chances to score, imagine what he could be like?
Not everyone thought goal machine Erling Haaland would take the Premier League by storm
These were some of the takes before the season started:
Haaland will fail like Zlatan Ibrahimovic did at Barcelona because Pep Guardiola can’t play with a big man up front; Haaland won’t fit into Guardiola’s team because he’s a counter-attacking striker; Haaland won’t score in the Premier League; he’s only been good in the ‘Farmers League’, the Bundesliga.
Let’s deal with them one at a time. The Ibrahimovic take is perhaps because they’re both Scandinavian, play at No 9 and have been signed by Pep. But that’s a superficial comparison. Their games are not similar and their personalities very different.
Some fans tipped him to fail at Manchester City when he arrived for £51million this summer
Erling and his father Alfie went through an exhaustive selection process before choosing City
Who knows why Pep couldn’t get along with Ibrahimovic? It probably had something to do with accommodating Lionel Messi in the team. And even Ibrahimovic can’t compete with that. But it was never going to be an issue with Haaland. His team had picked out Pep and City after an exhaustive process.
I filmed a documentary with Erling a few weeks ago and it details the process he and his advisers went through to pick a team, compiling pros and cons and assessing their relative strengths.
His dad, Alfie, was key but they were also able to talk through options with his agent Mino Raiola, before he passed away, and he supported their decisions.
They went into detail about the coach, the trajectory of the club, the squad that was there, the opportunity for improvement, the chance to win trophies. Real Madrid was an option but they have Karim Benzema and Kylian Mbappe looked like he was on his way there. City, by contrast, had a vacancy.
In terms of the sporting project, the coach, the challenge, the emotional pull of his dad’s team, they came to a rational, well-thought out decision. They knew how he could fit in there.
The Norwegian superstar has since scored 14 goals in all competitions so far this campaign
And Pep had picked him out. Or rather he picked out a centre-forward. At Barcelona Pep had Messi as false No 9 alongside David Villa and Pedro, three diminutive forwards. But Pep always wants to be ahead of the curve and I think he’s known for a couple of years that traditional centre-forwards are back. That’s why they moved for Harry Kane last summer.
City knew what they were signing and Erling knew the role he would be filling. If you think he is a counter-attacking striker, you haven’t been watching him in the Bundesliga.
Of course, he can score that way and Borussia Dortmund play on the break more than City. But his goalscoring is much more about the timing of his runs and the small movements he makes.
Look at his goal this season against Aston Villa. Well, it’s just a tap-in from close
