Pep Guardiola has justified Erling Haaland’s quiet Champions League game against Inter, when the Manchester City star failed to beat Cristiano Ronaldo’s record.
The Norwegian striker has been in prolific form again at the start of the 2024-25 season, scoring nine goals in four outings, including hat-tricks against Ipswich and West Ham. He did, however, go blank in a European battle against Serie A giants at the Etihad Stadium.
City opened their quest for continental glory with a goalless stalemate at home to Inter, with Italian rivals making life difficult for Guardiola’s side. Haaland was restricted to just 14 touches, seven completed passes and one shot across his 90 minutes on the field.
Guardiola told reporters of why his superstar No.9 found the going so tough: “There were six players around him. Six. Three behind, three in front. That’s how they kept him out of the game. That makes it difficult for any player. [Francesco] Acerbi, [Alessandro] Basotni were five metres away from him, [Hakan] Calhanoglou, [Piotr] Zielinski in front of him. That’s tough. We tried to use the spaces, that’s why [Ilkay] Gundogan had a couple of chances but Inter were stronger than us physically. We needed to get more players up alongside Erling and that’s what we did. I knew that Inter would defend like that.”
Haaland’s failure to find the target means that he can no longer beat Ronaldo to the record of quickest player to reach 100 goals for a club. CR7 achieved that feat in 105 games for Real Madrid, and City’s talismanic frontman will match that return if he scores in City’s eagerly-anticipated Premier League meeting with Arsenal on Sunday.
