City gives a football review to a rival in decline with two triplets of the Norwegian striker and the English winger
City gave United a monumental review in the Manchester derby this Sunday. The team led by Pep Guardiola defeated Erik ten Hag 6-3 in a match marked by an excellent first half for the locals, scoring four goals and having Haaland acting as an extraordinary host. The Norwegian scored his third consecutive hat-trick at home, handed out two assists and took all the attention along with Foden, who scored another hat-trick. Erling Haaland has already scored 14 goals in the Premier League, figures from another planet that threaten the records of historic players such as Shearer, Aguero, Salah or Rooney.
A football storm. Manchester United noticed that as soon as they jumped onto the pitch at the Etihad Stadium. The team led by Ten Hag went to play the derby and watched a wave called Manchester City go over it. Guardiola’s team is an almost perfect orchestra in which everyone knows how to play violin, trombone, harp and any instrument. The ‘citizens’ went into the clash with stifling pressure above the flag, with dizzying ball circulation and with a devastating punch this year. Haaland, De Bruyne and Bernardo Silva warned on a triple occasion that it was thunder before the storm. It didn’t rain, but the team in red was going to have a downpour like that of an era.
Ederson, Walker (Sergio Gómez, min. 41), Akanji, Aké, Cancelo, Gündogan (Palmer, min. 75), Bernardo Silva, De Bruyne, Foden (Mahrez, min. 74), Haaland and Grealish (Laporte, min. 75).
De Gea, Dalot, Varane (Lindelof, min. 40), Martínez, Malacia (Shaw, min. 46), McTominay (Casemiro, min. 59), Eriksen, Bruno Fernandes, Antony, Sancho (Fred, min. 70) and Rashford (Martial, min 59).
The first blow was dealt by Phil Foden. City’s youth squad completed that classic move of Guardiola’s script. The one in which the winger, in this case Bernardo Silva, wins the baseline and returns a ball so that the other winger, be it Leo Messi, Arjen Robben or in this case Foden, takes advantage of the space freed up by the ‘9’ to with pleasure and that everything seems as simple as possible. So much was cause and effect. It happened as a result of the huge difference between the two teams and led to a wave that United could not surf. Gundogan hit the post from a direct free kick, De Bruyne put De Gea to the test and the whole Etihad boiled over for whoever was coming. City was a hurricane of biblical dimensions that would hit anyone who wanted to move forward.
The victim was a United who was devastated. Guardiola’s side found leaks everywhere and Haaland took advantage of them to crush the derby. The Norwegian striker rounded out the second in a corner which he jubilantly won and just three minutes later made the third on another millimeter send from De Bruyne. The shock was total for the ‘red devils’, inert to the local festival. And things would get worse before halftime, when Foden took advantage of a ball in space to make poker and put an end to the patience of the visiting fans, who left the Etihad Stadium shaking their heads after just 45 minutes.
After the resumption to the City, the alarm did not go off. Guardiola’s men kept dreaming of a first-half review and United took advantage of that fear to come out of their shell, catch their breath, gain yards and be happy thanks to an Antony goal from outside the area, unattractive to Ederson. It was a boost to a city that believed in the uprising and went full throttle again, again with Haaland as the protagonist. Unchecked, the Norwegian completed a lateral cross from Foden to set a new record in his blazing fast career. No one had previously won three hat-tricks in a row at home.
City was already looking eye to eye at history. In 1926 they won 1-6 away from home and in 2011 they repeated the result at Old Trafford in a choral show by Balotelli, Agüero and Dzeko. Never before have they scored six goals at home against the eternal rival, but records are there to be broken and that’s easier to achieve when you have Haaland at the centre. Still hungry, the Norwegian lifted his head to give Foden sixth, a courtesy the youth side wouldn’t miss to score their special treble. It was the last glimpse of Pep Guardiola’s men in an exhibition that ended with two goals from Martial on the buzzer that didn’t change the appalling distance that now exists between the two Manchester giants.
Source: La Verdad
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