SecondHaaland scored his fifth goal in the 58th minute. Not that you’d tell it from his celebration, which was actually more of a non-celebration: a staccato jog, lips slightly curled, eyebrows raised, rather than the expression of a man who’d just written his name. What will go down in the annals of Manchester City history is the expression of a man who had just discovered a partially melted Fredo in his pocket.
Of course, everyone expected Haaland to play at this point: the game was won, Luton’s brief resistance was extinguished, and they safely advanced to the sixth round. But he didn’t. Time passed by 60 minutes, then 65 minutes, then 70 minutes. Still no movement from Guardiola. You lead 5-2. Wait a minute, Kovacic just scored, the score is 6-2. There will be a derby against Manchester United at the weekend. It was an open game with tackles and pushes everywhere. Haaland has only recently recovered from his injury. You have four substitutes left. So, Pep. What’s the idea here?
Naturally, one is tempted to diagnose a classic case of Guardiola’s anxiety disorder: the basic need for security and reassurance, the comfort of an extra goal when the mood of the game is high, respect for all possible ways ( Almost fearful). Opposition can hurt you. As we all know, six to two is the most dangerous score of all.
But I have a different theory. I think Guardiola is just as obsessed with sadism as the rest of us. I think he wants to get one of the few remaining feelings in football that he hasn’t experienced yet. He would like to see Haaland score six points.
Of course, this was both a power bending and a legitimate ploy: much like the Australian cricket captain in football who stubbornly took a huge third-innings lead at the Gabba and refused to claim it. After all, what’s the point of owning the most destructive toy in the sport if you’re not going to push it as hard as possible? What’s the point of buying Haaland if you’re not going to let him score six goals against a much smaller club for a fraction of your wages?
As a result, Haaland did not score six goals. Scams, charlatans, multi-billion pound blue bottle jobs and more. Still, it was an almost flawless performance: not just in terms of shooting and movement, the nuts and bolts of attacking forward, but also in terms of the way City are trying to operate these days. Gone are the kaleidoscopic triangles and painstaking graphics of Guardiola’s classic City sides for the most part. The fastest route to your goal is as always: a straight line.
Today, this is a more impatient City, a more efficient City, a more direct, physical City: a team with bold straight lines and an aversion to decoration and small talk. This may be why Jack Grealish fell out of favor earlier this season and the hard-working Jeremy Doku was more popular than him. Why dodgy Cole Palmer and Riyad Mahrez were deemed surplus to requirements in the summer, along with the signings of Mateo Kovacic and Matheus Nunes. Why are cities so tall now? Their 2018-19 title-winning team was the shortest team in the Premier League. Now, they are firmly in the middle of the standings, having been rebuilt and reorganized, coupled with the height of Haaland and Rodri.
Perhaps the ultimate expression of this new City directness was their second goal here, a modern twist on route one, with Haaland receiving the ball directly from goalkeeper Stefan Ortega, Pass the ball back to Kevin De Bruyne and then bomb straight to receive a through ball. Even the finish was straight, between Tim Krul’s legs.
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Of course, these things depend to a certain extent on the type of game your opponent asks you to play, and Luton’s determination to stay high and attack through the third line, allowing Haaland to play one-on-one with Teden Mongi, has helped shape City’s tactics.
Bernardo Silva buzzes around the pitch and Nunez switches from left to right and back again, but in a way it’s all distractions and gimmicks: when Plan A goes straight down the middle When rushing down, this is just an illusion of sideways motion. along.
Of course, other plans are still available. Not all of City’s opponents will be as unflinchingly forthcoming as this Luton team. Not everyone leaves themselves so vulnerable to counterattacks. City’s fairly new tactic of keeping the ball at the back will be less effective against teams that don’t allow themselves to be lured by the press. But even in the autumn of the Guardiola era, this team is still honing itself, molding itself into new shapes, still exploring its outer limits.
In the 77th minute, the substitution board finally came on. Haaland pretended not to notice. In the end, he reluctantly dragged himself off the field, thinking not about the five goals he had scored but the fact that he would have to wait five days for the next one.
