Football is in a constant state of evolution and the superstitious beliefs of footballers also change to keep up with the times. The old fear of “tempting fate” has largely given way to the fashionable practice of “manifesting”, where you proclaim your success in advance on the basis that believing is becoming. The old gods punished hubris, the new ones reward it.
It seems that Erling Haaland’s behaviour in the closing minutes of Manchester City’s 2-2 draw with Arsenal earlier in the season was obnoxious enough to bring the old gods out of retirement for one last job.
Haaland bounced the ball off Gabriel’s head in the aftermath of City’s late equaliser, asked Myles Lewis-Skelly “who the f*ck are you?” and famously shouted at Mikel Arteta: “Stay humble, eh? Stay humble”. It was an uncharacteristic display of open arrogance from a player who seldom gets booked and has never been sent off for Manchester City.
Ten minutes into the second half at the Emirates, Haaland probably thought he was getting away with it. His first meaningful intervention of the game had been to wriggle his way in front of William Saliba and make it 1-1 with a magnificent back-post header from Savinho’s cross. He celebrated the goal with a smug smile of satisfaction, marching stiffly towards the corner flag and ostentatiously ignoring Gabriel, who had gloated in his face after Arsenal’s early opening goal. It looked as though the gods were once again marching at his side.
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It turned out the gods had other ideas. Over the remaining 38 minutes Arsenal scored four goals and Haaland touched the ball only once.
You might have thought Haaland’s humiliation had peaked on 63 minutes, when Lewis-Skelly celebrated the killer third goal by openly mocking him with an imitation of his “meditation” celebration.
In fact the moment of maximum cringe only arrived 15 minutes after full time, when Haaland’s father Alfie tweeted in response to Arsenal’s post of their triumphant team: “‘This Team’ that wins everything? Ehhhhh, not.”
You’d have thought Haaland senior had been around football long enough to know you can’t call a team losers minutes after they’ve beaten you 5-1: what does that make you?
Pep Guardiola’s reaction in his post-match press conference to being told about how Lewis-Skelly had celebrated the goal was strange. “That’s good,” the City manager repeated, before sitting in silence with a vacant smile. It looked as though someone had momentarily switched off his brain.
It’s said that teams take on the personality of their manager but this brainfreeze was a case of the manager taking on the personality of his team. This was a cathartic night for Arsenal, but they couldn’t have done it without City’s help.
The first half was a dreary encounter between a team that can’t play attacking football any more and a team that refused to.
If playing the ball out from the back has a bad name among many supporters, this match demonstrated the reasons why. People don’t come to the stadiums every week to watch David Raya stand in the D rolling the ball around under his studs as he waits for an opponent to come and press him.
It was the kind of first half to make you uncomfortably conscious of your own mortality, or at least to wonder if it might be time for the Premier League to introduce a shot clock. Long periods where almost nothing happened caused the mind to drift towards deeper questions. Why had Arsenal reacted to taking the early lead by dropping back and becoming passive, rather than pushing forward and ripping City apart? Is Arteta’s mind the only place where City are still the fearsome team of 2023?
The only chances for either side in that half came as a result of the opponent making a mistake in build-up play. Happily for Arsenal, City did this quite a lot. John Stones played Manuel Akanji into trouble with a telegraphed pass for Arsenal’s opener. A little later, Stefan Ortega played a ridiculous short pass to Mateo Kovacic, who was running towards him under enormous pressure from Declan Rice. Rice won the ball only for Kai Havertz to produce a stunning miss from 12 yards.
Ortega’s decision to play that pass to Kovacic was stupid to the point of being mindless, but rather than criticise him personally it should be understood that he’s just following orders. As Guardiola said afterwards, defending his team’s build-up approach. “The alternative is put long balls, and what happened every time we put long balls? We lost it.”
The problem is City also lost it when they played short or medium balls. Haaland had barely put them back in the game when Phil Foden played a crossfield pass directly to the feet of Thomas Partey, who advanced a few yards and made it 2-1 via a deflection. It was, again, terrible football from City, but at least it was true to Guardiola’s principles.
Regaining the lead so quickly seemed to unblock something in Arsenal’s collective consciousness and the last half-hour was a completely different game. It was as though the home team were suddenly confident of their superiority and at last unafraid to demonstrate it.
Havertz charged up the field to score the fourth from a much more difficult chance than the one he had missed in the first half. Ethan Nwaneri came on to add a magnificent fifth with what is already a signature curling finish.
Long before the end the Arsenal fans were olé-ing as their team swished the ball effortlessly around the smoking ruins where the City midfield used to be. “To allow them to have so much of the ball towards the end is frustrating, when we’re a team that is so dominant,” said Stones.
Stones is living in the past if he thinks City are a “dominant” team. They have lost the running power that always underpinned their dominance of possession. A midfield partnership of Bernardo Silva and Kovacic can’t compete physically with anyone in the Premier League. When they lose the ball they struggle to get it back.
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Meanwhile at the top of the field, Haaland drifted around unable to get anywhere near the game as his team-mates refused to kick the ball anywhere in his general direction. Surely a player on his salary should be in a team that wants to play to his strengths? Has he really just signed up for nine more years of this?
Arsenal will hope this win is a launch pad for the same kind of relentless run they managed in the second half of last season. As for City, physically weak and mentally brittle, they look like a team that already want the season to be over. Not a good place to be on February 2nd.
