If Erling Haaland’s admission of culpability after Manchester City’s recent defeat at Aston Villa was an attempt to stir himself into better form, it hasn’t worked. His struggles and that of his team go on amid a haze of aimless and utterly rudderless football.
Here Haaland’s stand-out error was a headline maker, a missed penalty early in the second half. Everton goalkeeper Jordan Pickfordmade the save but the penalty was desperately weak and when Haaland headed in during the flurry that followed, he was a yard offside.
The great Norwegian now has onePremier League goal to his name since November 9 while City’s run of disastrous form now sits at one win in all competitions in thirteen games. Of the 18 league games Pep Guardiola’s defending champions have played this season, they have won just eight.
Here against an increasingly ambitious Everton side, City were staggeringly directionless. They started both halves of the game well and were ahead after quarter of an hour through Bernardo Silva.
But Guardiola’s team lack leadership both on and off the field it seems and when the rhythm deserts them in a game they are clueless in terms of trying to get it back. City look physically shot and mentally spent.
Ghost footballers lost in the Boxing Day mist and the longer it goes on the more we wonder whether Guardiola will wake up one morning and realise it’s time to let somebody else have a go.
Erling Haaland missed a penalty as Manchester City dropped yet more points at the Etihad
Jordan Pickford made the save but the out-of-form striker’s effort was desperately weak
Pep Guardiola’s men continued their miserable run of form as they were held by Everton
Everton were decent opposition here but no more than that. A City team playing at 75 per cent would have beaten them but this version is nowhere near that and that particular percentage is only heading south.
Once Everton’s young prospect Iliman Ndiaye equalised towards the end of the first half, Sean Dyche’s team were as likely to win this game as they were to lose it. City didn’t really threaten again after Haaland’s miss and Everton could have snuck it at the end when they managed to waste a four on two counter attack with just a minute of added time remaining.
City are down on form and fitness and fun but were high on energy and purpose early on. Everton were the team who seemed a little sluggish as they found themselves penned in and under pressure.
The difference from a City point of view was the speed with which they were able to move the ball. With Jeremy Doku and the young Brazilian Savinho eager to make inroads from the wide positions and Haaland living off Jarrod Branthwaite’s shoulder, Guardiola’s team were as menacing as they had been for a while. Admittedly, they were working to a pretty low bar.
City were almost a head in only the third minute as they recycled a corner on the left side and stand-in central defender Josko Gvardiol rose unchallenged to head against the near post when he would have expected to score.
That moment served to lift the home crowd a little and by way of return City worked off the back of it. Savinho beat two defenders to cut in from the right and bring a save from Pickford with a low left foot shot to the near post. Then, in the fifteenth minute, City scored.
It was a simple enough move as Doku held the ball and his position on the left and waited for Silva to make his run off the shoulder of Branthwaite. When he did so, he seemed a little wide to shoot with any kind of hope but when he did Branthwaite couldn’t get a full block on it and the ball span strangely and slowly across the face of goal and in to the far corner.
Branthwaite should have done better and Pickford maybe could have done too. City didn’t care, though. The was only Silva’s second goal since August and it was overdue. City celebrated with all the gusto you would have expected.
England goalkeeper Jordan Pickford denied Haaland to keep the scores level in Manchester
Everton’s Iliman Ndiaye had equalised with a brilliant finish shortly before half-time
Ndiaye found the top corner after a ball from the right made it’s way through the City defence
Pickford was able to comfortably deny Haaland’s tame spot-kick and keep the scores level
Everton hadn’t enjoyed a single foray up front at this point and there wasn’t an initial reaction. Haaland bullied Branthwaite as he has done before in the 27th minute only to be forced wide Pickford’s dash from goal.
Then, in the 34th minute, a long ball to the Norwegian was worked left by Phil Foden. Had Silva’s first time shot with the outside of his left foot been placed a foot to the left, City would have been two goals up. But it flew wide and left us wondering why he hadn’t taken a touch first or indeed used his other foot.
Whatever the rights and wrongs of that decision, City were rueful soon after as Everton broke to level the game. All Dyche’s team had managed up until this point was a half volley from Idrissa Gueye that had been held easily by Stefan Ortega in the City goal.
But when a cross from Abdoulaye Doucoure was missed by Manuel Akanji in the 37th minute the ball reached Ndiaye who controlled it with one touch and half volleyed it beautifully back across Ortega and into the top corner.
The beauty of the goal was in the timing. Ndiaye was off balance with his weight moving backwards but still managed to find the power to beat the goalkeeper. It was a fabulous effort from a really talented young player.
City’s confidence is brittle at the moment and this is the kind of thing that happens when that is the case. It was to their credit, then, that they started the second half strongly as Gvardiol hit the foot of the post with another header before Pickford saved low with his feet from Savinho and Mateo Kovacic drilled the rebound wide.
Savinho was a threat with his directness and in the 52nd minute it paid off. Vitaliy Mykolenko’s challenge was rash and high as his opponent drove towards him in the penalty area. Referee Simon Hooper gave the penalty but why he didn’t show the Everton defender a second yellow card and send him off only he will know.
Haaland’s penalty was too close to Pickford and the fact he was offside when he headed in the rebound probably summed up his current struggles. What’s more, Foden was standing behind him in an onside position and had Haaland left the ball his team mate would in all likelihood have scored.
Bernardo Silva had given City the perfect start to the game when he scored at the near post
Silva was congratulated by his team-mates after breaking the deadlock on Boxing Day
From that point on, it was all a bit of a huff and a puff from City. There had been a flurry of incisive football before the penalty, just as there had been at the start of the first half. But once again it didn’t really endure. There didn’t seem to be anybody in a home shirt capable of really getting hold of the game. With a little less than quarter of an hour to go, Guardiola threw Kevin de Bruyne on and that felt almost like the final throw of the dice given the lack of quality and experience on the home bench here.
The best chance of period following Haaland’s penalty miss had actually fallen to Everton as Doucoure volleyed a far post cross from Jack Harrison towards the near corner of the goal only for Rico Lewis is block. And this was pretty much the way it was for Everton as they edged closer towards another valuable point. Stay in the game and try and break with purpose when possible.
They almost found a way through while seven minutes remaining as Nathan Ake – struggling with an injury – could not prevent a ball being laid back in to the path of Orel Mangala 22 yards out. When the first time shot arrived it struck Akanji and frankly could have gone anywhere. It missed the post by about a foot.
City were given six added minutes to turn one point in to three. It seemed a lot. Lewis could have been the hero almost immediately but spanked a decent chance high over the bar from just inside the penalty area. Then Everton broke well but could not make an overload count. From there the game petered out and its final significant act featured Foden – last season’s double player of the year – being booked for a shirt tug to prevent an Everton break away. It seemed appropriate.