Man City have added brawn to beauty with Haaland and De Bruyne
JACK GAUGHAN: Pep Guardiola has added brawn to Manchester City’s beauty with the devastating directness of Erling Haaland and Kevin De Bruyne forcing Arsenal into a miserable retreat both in their Etihad shellacking and the title race
- Manchester City beat Arsenal 4-1 to take control of Premier League title race
- Erling Haaland and Kevin De Bruyne combined to superb effect to sink Gunners
- City’s combination of attractive football but also directness causes problems
There is a service tunnel hidden away at the Etihad Stadium. All away teams travel down it to enter, their coach passing underground, beneath the home supporters who greet Manchester City’s arrival in transit.
About 100 yards away, towards Ashton New Road, Arsenal’s two buses decided to turn themselves around. They then slowly reversed all the way in, a metaphor with tentacles when it comes to Wednesday night.
For their title challenge, for their occasional refusal to follow instructions on the height of Mikel Arteta’s preferred defensive line.
Arsenal backpedalled from the off but more appropriately, were forced there by City, whose form continues to scale a different peak with each week that goes by, with each extension of this unbeaten run. Seventeen and counting.
‘Maybe they weren’t at their best level because we were really good,’ Pep Guardiola said and he was right. Stuart Pearce was busy calling it the best performance he has ever witnessed on the radio.
Kevin De Bruyne and Erling Haaland combined to devastating effect as Manchester City thrashed Arsenal 4-1 to take control of the Premier League title race
Haaland put the icing on the cake after letting his hair down, netting Man City’s fourth
Pep Guardiola revelled in a win that puts the title race in City’s hands ahead of the final stretch
The result moved City to within two points of leaders Arsenal, but they have two games in hand
The mechanics of the shellacking, one that lays down another marker – if another was required – were obviously worked on during the only full training session beforehand.
Knock it long is far too rudimentary an explanation – overloading midfield and man marking were key ingredients – yet up it went to Erling Haaland and there was Kevin De Bruyne to feast on the second ball.
It was a pattern. Kyle Walker’s first throw was long to Haaland with nobody within 20 yards of him. Guardiola rollicked Ruben Dias early on for clipping an aimless ball straight to Gabriel on halfway.
But vertical was the plan, the opening goal coming from a John Stones punt to Haaland. When direct, City devastate. The same thing happened against Bayern Munich.
For a while it has seemed obvious that City are better against better opposition – better teams don’t defend as deep, for starters – but that has been crystallised by slapping the Bundesliga champions and then their greatest threat in the league, who stood on course for a 100-point season at one stage, for three and fours in the space of a fortnight.
Going man-to-man, Dias following Martin Odegaard into midfield and knowing someone will cover the best example, gives them the opportunity to express physical dominance.
City are no longer a team of David Silvas and they’ve started priding themselves on brawn to supplement the beauty.
The team is now incredibly powerful throughout, evident as Manuel Akanji marked Bukayo Saka out of the game in an unfamiliar left back role on his finest night since signing for £16million.
It was a night of pure misery for Arsenal at the Etihad as they backpedalled under pressure
Arsenal fans sense their title opportunity has slipped away with City poised to overtake them
Haaland bullied Arsenal’s centre-backs Rob Holding (pictured) and Gabriel all night
Haaland has a shot at goal after stealing space on Gabriel as City dominated at the Etihad
The blend of strength and class is epitomised by Haaland and De Bruyne, the double act who when in full flight look like they are somehow cheating. De Bruyne came off with a niggle but City will expect him to be fine for Fulham on Sunday and the Belgian’s looked re-energised recently.
Only in early March was Guardiola demanding that De Bruyne, 32, go back to perfecting the ‘simple things’.
There were times this term where he forced the issue, tried too hard to play the Hollywood ball, but now this intuitive relationship with Haaland sees him eyeing his own assist record, shared with Thierry Henry. De Bruyne is four shy of 20 now, with seven games to go.
Since Guardiola’s comments, he has 11 goal contributions in eight matches.
De Bruyne is often said to elevate his game to extra levels when angry and the City manager knew exactly what he was doing when he lit the fuse.
‘Kevin is a master of the assist with or without Erling,’ Guardiola said. ‘Erling scores goals all the time with or without Kevin. But together, when teams press so high and with those balls with space behind, they are so dangerous. When we can find Kevin and he can run, he’s unstoppable.’
De Bruyne beats Aaron Ramsdale with a perfectly-placed low shot to open the scoring
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