Drawing against the deputy squad leader, is he incompatible with Manchester City s new system?

For Manchester City, this round of Premier League may be an excellent opportunity for the team to qualify for the Champions League: against Chelsea and Newcastle, they already have a one-point lead. Now the Saints they meet have only won two Premier League games this season, and Newcastle and Chelsea will face a head-on battle. No matter who is the final winner, the loser will be left behind by Manchester City.

As a result, at St. Mary's Stadium, Manchester City was tied stubbornly by Southampton. Not only did he fail to score points, he also gave the Saints a timely help. Relying on this draw, the home team scored 12 points this season, surpassing the lowest score record in the Premier League set by Derby County in 2007-08.

If Manchester City could still use injuries as an excuse for losing some time, Guardiola can no longer use this to blame in this game. In this game, Haaland, who had been injured for a long time, returned to work after being released from ban and got the starting opportunity as soon as he came back. Marmush, who had been in a hot state, was on the bench.

However, after the Norwegians returned, the Blue Moon's attack had no feeling of mercury pouring out of the ground, and Haaland was not adapted to this system. In the whole game, Guardiola's team scored a total of 26 shots, but Manchester City striker only got one shot. When Manchester City counterattacked in injury time, De Bruyne fed him a 45-degree cross - because the shot was too late to adjust and the shooting angle was average, the Norwegian's header was expected to score only 0.05.

You can say that in a small space, Haaland has to provide a fulcrum to his teammates, which somewhat limits the Norwegian's performance. However, looking at the number of shots, eight of Manchester City's team shot more than Haaland. Relying on various set pieces, Ruben Dias and Akanji's two centre-backs also scored 7 shots - even though the Blue Moon system focuses on a national team blooming more points, this flower obviously did not bloom here in Haaland.

Of course, let Haaland, an opportunist who focuses on confrontation and mostly runs to seek, do some support. In this game, the Norwegian's running hot zone was basically distributed inside and outside the opponent's penalty area, which made it difficult for him to get too much space to get the ball. The number of touches in the whole game was only 17 times, which made his offensive influence approach zero, and he could not integrate into Manchester City's passing rhythm. Even if he could get a space to pass and find his teammate in the second half of the game, he would not be able to cooperate.

Although Guardiola's arrangement of troops may be the fundamental reason why Manchester City cannot speed up for a long time, it is an indisputable fact that Haaland blocks space on the offensive end and cannot combine personal abilities with the team system. After all, to be honest, when performing the rib pass and cut, if the center of our team is still fighting with the opponent in the penalty area, then the team's intuitive feeling on the court is that there is no one.

For Manchester City, the journey of this season is of course not over. They will also face Crystal Palace in the FA Cup final, and face Bournemouth and Fulham in the next two rounds, which will determine whether the Blue Moon can enter the Champions League next season. For Haaland, after all, he returned from injury and left him with plenty of time to adjust his condition. However, at this time point at the end of the season, the entanglement between the emotions of the number one attacker and the team's stable system and the team's stable system as much as possible may become a major problem that plagues Guardiola.