Earlier in the week, when asked about Man City's first goal in the US tour, Haaland said he would have to score in that way (goal cutter and short-range cushion). The Norwegian striker knows that at the Etihad, he was not allowed to play freely, holding the ball from midfield and using breakthrough power. Everything must follow the rules, true to what Pep has outlined.
Other friendships are real, this is natural but Haaland can't think, everything is so difficult. For 90 minutes at King Power, the Norwegian striker could not score any goals in the context of the rookie being compared to him on Liverpool's side - Nunez playing well and still scoring. The kick-off from about 6m away ended the match as if it had ended a disappointing performance by the former Dortmund star.
It can be seen that Pep served Haaland in the first official match of this rookie. Or in other words, the Spanish coach wanted to experiment from the first minutes instead of waiting like Klopp when using Nunez.
Playing on the wings of Grealish and Mahrez, Haaland struggled to move to receive the ball. The Norwegian star's running style is quite similar to what Jesus used to do, which was to go from the wings to the inside to coordinate in pieces instead of accelerating from the middle of the field. However, due to his ball handling skills that his teammates could not master, Haaland lost control in decisive situations and severed the attack of the home team.
Man City's squad distance with Haaland is an unresolved problem for Pep. It was proven through the situation where De Bruyne held the ball in the second half. When the Belgian midfielder rushed up to face four Liverpool players, Haaland stood still (in an offside position) and only stared at De Bruyne. Seeing that, Grealish was forced to turn from the left wing to the right wing to coordinate with De Bruyne. Unfortunately, Liverpool players quickly overthrew that plan and took the ball back. It made De Bruyne angry and showed his attitude immediately.
Coordinating with Grealish and Mahrez was not good, Pep let Haaland pair up with Alvarez and Foden. When seeing Alvarez on the touchline, it was thought Haaland would be substituted because these two players played in the same position. However, the Norwegian striker was still retained. At this time, Man City has become even more confused, they no longer have a true right winger star like Mahrez.
Alvarez scored, if he followed the correct formation with a real center forward, the one who scored must have been Haaland. Pep doesn't know what he was thinking when Alvarez became more active since being put on the field. Perhaps, moving to Man City when Haaland was just around the corner would put less pressure on Alvarez.
At Manchester City, the pressure is clearly greater than Dortmund. That was shown through Haaland's ball handling in penalty shootouts. In the first half, the high jump with a connecting striker did not look very awkward, not the style of the Norwegian super striker. After that, the situation of trying to volley in the air without knowing whether the ball will reach his feet or not also showed that this star's feeling was not good.
Therefore, not only finding a way to play for Haaland, Pep also has to relieve pressure on the world's leading talented striker today. The season has begun, the testing time like the English Super Cup is no longer there.
