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“Oh god… He said that? Jamie Carragher said that??” were the words by Pep Guardiola as he was speaking to the media on February 21 ahead of his team Manchester City’s match against Liverpool in the Premier League. This reaction came from Pep to a question asked by a reporter about Jamie Carragher’s comments on Erling Haaland after Manchester City’s recent defeat to Real Madrid in the Champions League round of 16 playoff tie. City recently travelled to the Bernabeu and were defeated 3-1, courtesy to a hat-trick by Kylian Mbappe.
In one of the talk-shows that followed this game of the Champions League, former English football player Jamie Caragher had something to say about Haaland not playing in this massive and important fixture against Madrid because he wasn’t fit enough. He said, “So are we saying this injury was Rudigeritis?” taking a dig at Haaland saying that he didn’t want to face Rudiger.
Haaland’s poor record against Real Madrid
Erling Haaland signed for Manchester City in the summer of 2022 coming in from Borussia Dortmund. The striker has had a superb start to life at the Etihad having 91 appearances till date in the Premier League with 98 G/A. His overall record in the Champions League is absolutely stunning with 48 goals in 49 games with all the clubs he’s played at. The record with Manchester City in the Champions League is equally remarkable with 26 UCL goals in 29 games. Haaland has also broken numerous records with these goal-scoring feats.
However his stats against Real Madrid look rather dismal. Since joining City in 2022, Man City and Madrid have faced off each other six times in the knockout phases of the Champions League. Amongst all these meetings, Erling Haaland has only managed to register two goals against the Los Blancos and co-incidentally this was the first leg of the round of 16 playoff tie of this season where Antonio Rudiger was not part of the Madrid team.
Pep Guardiola has a tough challenge ahead of him as Man City faces off league leaders Liverpool at the weekend.
