Manchester City – Leipzig: a historic Haaland, a cautious German defense
Haaland wanders, Gvardiol and the defense stumble. PANORAMIC
TOPS/FLOPS – Manchester City quietly disposed of RB Leipzig (7-0), in the knockout stages of the Champions League on Tuesday evening. Here are our Tops and Flops.
TOPS
Erling Haaland in the legend
As obvious. The term “Top” even seems too weak to describe Erling Haaland’s performance this Tuesday evening against Leipzig. He was simply everywhere, touching no less than 30 balls. The Norwegian attempted eight shots for as many on target. The number 9 of the SkyBlues offered a quintuple (22nd, 24th, 45th + 2, 53rd, 57th) during the meeting – the third in the history of the Champions League after Luiz Adriano in 2014 and Lionel Messi in 2012. An efficiency, a realism and a regularity of which only he has the secret. Beyond the goals, he played the role of attacking leader by sheltering his team by scoring twice in 78 seconds in the first period, when the German club’s start to the match was rather interesting. An air conditioning that put the church back in the middle of the village.
City’s attacking seriousness
It seems pretty obvious when a team puts seven in a game. But it is necessary to underline the offensive copy made by the players of Pep Guardiola this Tuesday evening. They sought to combine efficiently and quickly in small spaces, with one touch of the ball, from the start of the game. With Kevin De Bruyne as conductor, without forgetting the technicality of other assets such as Bernardo Silva, Jack Grealish or İlkay Gündoğan. There was finally no relaxation, as proof the Citizens continued to press where it hurt to increase the score in front of their audience. The match ended with 23 strikes including 16 on target, two amounts touched, 10 corners played and more than 63% possession. This is called a score in the musical world.
Read alsoChampions League: Manchester City and Erling Haaland crush Leipzig
FLOPS
Leipzig’s defensive mistakes
An obvious when you concede seven goals but the defense of RB Leipzig has made a very poor collective copy. Whether it was captain Willi Orban or Croatian nugget Josko Gvardiol, the defenders of the German club seemed terrified by the high pressing installed by Manchester City. Too many lost balls, technical waste, bad raises near the surface of Leipzig. Several times the Germans almost immediately gave the ball back to the SkyBlues. They offered very few solutions to their goalkeeper Janis Blaswich who nevertheless made eight saves. The majority of Haaland’s goals are finally taken in a second or even third time, no one seemed awake enough to clear and release the game? A disorganized and above all too passive defense.
A dubious refereeing body
So most certainly Leipzig did not take seven because of the referee of the meeting, the Slovenian Slavko Vincic. However, several game facts worked in favor of Manchester City while the refereeing decisions would indeed have been different. For starters, the penalty awarded on Haaland’s opener is more than generous. Benjamin Henrichs seems to have touched the ball very little with his hand on the head of Rodri (20th). Then, Marco Rose’s players wisely complained to the referee during Haaland’s heavy pressing on goalkeeper Janis Blaswich, on the second goal (23rd). Finally, the kamikaze exit of goalkeeper Ederson, who came to hit Laimer more than 35 meters from his cages, could have been worth an exclusion from the City goalkeeper, but the referee whistled for foul on the Leipzig player and even warned Timo Werner for protest (34th). At ten against eleven, the scenario would surely have been different.
