Erling Haaland admits his, and Manchester City’s, recent performances have not been good enough but backed boss Pep Guardiola to “find the solutions”.
City have now won just once in their last 12 games after going down 2-1 at Aston Villa this lunchtime, goals from Jhon Duran and Morgan Rogers putting the hosts in control before Phil Foden’s late consolation.
Haaland was a peripheral figure once again as City struggled to impose themselves in the face of some ferocious Villa pressing and the Norway striker concedes an improvement is required, both individually and collectively.
Man City have now lost nine of their last 12 games across all competitions…
That’s more than in their previous 106 matches combined (8) 🤯 pic.twitter.com/jpznVDfRKh
— Football on TNT Sports (@footballontnt) December 21, 2024
Haaland – it’s not good enough
He told TNT Sports: “Of course we are disappointed, it’s not good enough. It’s not good enough from me.
“They’re good players, it’s difficult to come here but we’re Man City we should be out there. We have to continue, we have to believe and we have to keep working hard.
“We have to continue. First I’m looking at myself, I haven’t been doing things good enough, I haven’t been scoring my chances. I have to do better, I haven’t been good enough.”
The defeat continues what is undeniably the biggest crisis of Guardiola’s managerial career but Haaland backed the Catalan to guide City through the storm.
“He won the Premier League six times in seven years, so we will never forget that,” he added.
“He will find the solutions. He has been doing that every single year. We still believe in him, we have to work harder than ever right now.
“We know how important confidence is and you can see that it affects every human being. That is how it is, we have to continue and stay positive even though it is difficult.”
“We struggle to score and we concede goals” 😳
Pep Guardiola gives @julesbreach his analysis on Man City’s 2-1 defeat to Aston Villa…
📺 @tntsports & @discoveryplusUK pic.twitter.com/eTiBhWdZgf
— Football on TNT Sports (@footballontnt) December 21, 2024
We are going to regain confidence – Guardiola
Guardiola was disappointed by his team’s second-half performance.
He told TNT Sports: “We make a really good first half, second half we dropped. We changed our pressing for the reason John [Stones] could not continue.
“We had good moments, we had chances, more chances than in the [Manchester] United game, but in the second half we dropped and our pressing was not good enough. We found a goal in the end, but too late.
“We struggle to score and we concede goals.”
He remains confident City will emerge from this situation, though, and regain their confidence.
“Step by step, we have nice personalities in the team and sooner or later we are going to find it,” he said.
