Manchester Metropolis is ready to host Liverpool in Matchday 26 of the 2024-25 Premier League season, following a big blow in mid-week with their Champions League elimination by Actual Madrid. Forward of the essential conflict, Pep Guardiola has raised doubts over star striker Erling Haaland’s availability.
The alarm bells went off final Saturday throughout Metropolis’s 4-0 victory over Newcastle United when Haaland was substituted within the 88th minute after struggling a knee damage. The Norwegian ahead was disregarded as an unused substitute through the Champions League recreation in Madrid, and Guardiola was hesitant to substantiate his standing for the Liverpool match.
“Tomorrow we’ll know extra. I don’t know but. Hopeful? Perhaps, however I can’t say for positive. We practice as we speak and tomorrow, he’ll check, I assume, however I don’t know,” Guardiola stated in his pre-match press convention, indicating {that a} last-minute determination could possibly be made.
Whereas Omar Marmoush scored a hat-trick in Metropolis’s final Premier League recreation, Guardiola was fast to emphasise Haaland’s significance to the group: “It’s higher to have Erling on the pitch than not. However with Erling, we’re the place we’re proper now. Everyone is accountable for each the great and the dangerous issues for the group. With Erling, we’re stronger.”
Regardless of not being at his greatest in comparison with earlier seasons, Haaland stays one among Metropolis’s standout performers within the 2024-25 marketing campaign. In 35 appearances throughout all competitions, the striker has netted 27 targets and registered 3 assists, at the moment sitting second on the league’s goal-scoring leaderboard.
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Guardiola on Manchester Metropolis’s possibilities towards Liverpool
Liverpool, with a commanding 8-point lead and only one loss within the Premier League, are the favorites going into the Sunday showdown. Nonetheless, regardless of Metropolis’s midweek setback and a number of other key gamers sidelined with accidents, Guardiola stays optimistic about his group’s possibilities towards the league leaders.
“The Premier League is massively necessary for us. We’ve had some excellent video games. Even within the 5-1 loss to Arsenal, I believed we performed rather well for 60 minutes, however we’ve not been secure. However in different video games, like towards Newcastle, we hit a very excessive degree,” he stated.
Though Metropolis is successfully out of the title race following a collection of poor outcomes, Guardiola acknowledged that securing Champions League qualification stays the membership’s important goal for the rest of the season. “We’ll attempt to play nicely and take the factors we have to keep within the hunt and qualify for subsequent season,” he concluded.
