<\/p>\n
Erling Haaland continues to be the problem at Manchester City as Pep Guardiola\u2019s side stumbled into the Champions League quarter-finals against Leipzig.<\/p>\n
Haaland only managed to score five goals in a 7-0 destruction of Leipzig, with Ilkay Gundogan and Kevin de Bruyne ruining the illusion somewhat by contributing fine strikes of their own.<\/p>\n
A 1-1 draw in the first leg suggested Manchester City had a difficult task in their last-16 tie against Leipzig but the Bundesliga\u2019s third-placed side were obliterated over the course of 90 ruthless minutes.<\/p>\n
Haaland opened the scoring with a 22nd-minute penalty, harshly awarded for handball against Benjamin Henrichs.<\/p>\n
The Norwegian doubled the lead almost immediately by nodding in on the rebound after a rejuvenated De Bruyne<\/strong><\/a>\u2018s effort thundered off the crossbar.<\/p>\n The hat-trick was complete in stoppage time when Haaland made sure Ruben Dias\u2019 header from a corner crossed the line after hitting the post.<\/p>\n Gundogan completed a fine team move \u2013 in which Haaland was involved \u2013 to make it 4-0 early in the second half, before Manchester City properly flexed their muscles.<\/p>\n Haaland added a fourth and fifth to his own personal tally with similarly scrappy but clinical goals, twice capitalising on haphazard defending by punishing poor clearances.<\/p>\n His already ludicrous statistics<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0were taken to a whole new level on a truly preposterous evening.<\/p>\n Erling Haaland has now scored 1.9% of all Man City goals in PL & CL history<\/p>\n \u2014 Duncan Alexander (@oilysailor) March 14, 2023<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n De Bruyne also had a phenomenal game, which the Belgian capped off by curling a sublime effort into the top left corner after great work from Riyad Mahrez in second-half stoppage-time.<\/p>\n Leipzig manager Marco Rose called it, praising former Salzburg striker Haaland ahead of the game.<\/p>\n \u201cErling Haaland\u00a0is one of the top number nines in the world,\u201d he said in his pre-match press conference<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cOf course, City played last year more with the false nine but, for me, they\u2019re much more difficult to play now because you don\u2019t know.<\/p>\n \u201cThey play deep, or they play short, they have more possibilities. They can use Erling as a wall player or send him in deep spaces.<\/p>\n \u201cFor me they\u2019re more complete now. If he gets [more] used to what Pep wants, it could get really good for Pep and Manchester City.<\/p>\n\n