Erling Haaland was dropped to the bench for the Champions League clash against Copenhagen because he was tired. It turns out that the Norwegian is human after all.
And on a night when City’s goal machine was given a rest his team-mates failed to find the back of the net for the first time since April, when they drew a blank against Atletico Madrid.
After Sergio Gómez had been sent off in the 30th minute City had to play an hour with ten men and with such a long time to compete with a one-man deficit Guardiola said he was delighted with the effort shown by his team.
“I’m really satisfied. The team gave everything when it was ten versus eleven,” Guardiola said. “We started really well and with ten we resisted. When we had the ball we were clever and didn’t push much.
“A good point — maybe not mathematically — but we have almost qualified for the next round and that was the main target.”
In fact, City did go through to the last 16 after Sevilla were held to a 1-1 draw by Borussia Dortmund in their match in Germany last night.
The first half featured three interventions by VAR and three trips to the pitchside monitor for the referee, Artur Soares Dias. With 11 minutes on the clock Rodri thought he had given the visitors the lead with a thunderbolt from outside the area. Yet Dias decided Riyad Mahrez had handled the ball as it rocketed through the bodies in the box past Kamil Grabara.
“No,” was Guardiola’s short response when asked in his post-match press conference if he understood the handball rule.
He is not the only one. The ruling on similar situations has been so inconsistent all season that City’s remonstrating players were right to feel aggrieved on the touchline.
“A bit frustrating, of course,” Rodri said. “No one realised what is happening — they said it was a handball. I don’t know if it was intentional. It was a mess.”
There was similar confusion when a penalty was given to City for handball. Dias was back to his monitor and he adjudged Nicolai Boilesen’s arm had struck Manuel Akanji’s header from a corner. Mahrez stepped up and Grabara saved to his right.
If the Copenhagen head coach, Jacob Neestrup, had not breathed a sigh of relief when the teamsheet dropped and Haaland was on the bench then he surely would have done when Grabara saved. No doubt if Haaland had been on the pitch he would have added to his tally of 28 goals in 22 Champions League games.
While City were correct to be aggrieved at the disallowed goal there could be no complaints when they were reduced to ten men. Gómez brought down Hakon Haraldsson on the edge of the area, denying him a goalscoring opportunity, and was dismissed.
Mahrez was the man who made way as Guardiola brought on Rúben Dias, the centre back, and shortly after switched to a back three with Rodri dropping back alongside Dias and Aymeric Laporte.
From then on it was a professional performance from City. For a team that has scored 15 goals in their past three games this was a different sort of display: resilient and dogged against a Copenhagen team buoyed by their raucous home support.
The fingertips of Ederson denied Lukas Lerager a goal from outside the area and substitute Isak Bergmann Johannesson could only lie on the turf in despair after a brilliant ball from Victor Kristiansen had set him up for a tap-in at the far post.
For City the numerical disadvantage did not reduce the amount of possession they had but rather changed their style, and that spark we have become so accustomed to seeing in these City displays was missing.
João Cancelo tested the hands of Grabara from outside the area, Julián Álvarez looked lively at times but lacked that precision needed to find a breakthrough and Kevin De Bruyne also saw an effort saved.
With City searching for a goal, Haaland kept his tracksuit on and Guardiola sent on Phil Foden and Bernardo Silva instead. At this stage the City head coach seemed happy to get out of Denmark with a clean sheet and a point after the circumstances they had found themselves in after an hour.
“When you’re one hour [with] ten versus eleven and don’t lose in Europe it’s really good,” Guardiola said. “All the players gave absolutely everything and we got a point, so we’ll take it.”
They will take the point and the positives back to Manchester to prepare for Liverpool on Sunday. And with Haaland rested and raring to go, the Norwegian will no doubt be in the mood to add to that ever-increasing goal tally.
