After suffering a bruising fifth consecutive defeat on Saturday evening, it’s no longer a stretch to say that Manchester City are in crisis.
Tottenham’s 4-0 thrashing of Pep Guardiola’s side marked a new low in the club’s worst-ever run of recent times, with the champions now sitting eight points behind leaders Liverpool in the Premier League table, in a game which saw several poor performances in our player ratings.
Next up for City is a trip to Anfield to take on Arne Slot’s high-flying side, with the Reds knowing that they can open up a whopping 11-point lead, should they inflict more misery on City on Sunday.
City have been dealing with a lengthy injury list over the past month, but it is becoming increasingly clear that it is not only injuries to blame for their current malaise.
| Position | Team | Played MP | Won W | Drawn D | Lost L | For GF | Against GA | Diff GD | Points Pts |
| 1 |  LiverpoolLiverpool | 12 | 10 | 1 | 1 | 24 | 8 | 16 | 31 |
| 2 |  Man CityManchester City | 12 | 7 | 2 | 3 | 22 | 17 | 5 | 23 |
| 3 |  ChelseaChelsea | 12 | 6 | 4 | 2 | 23 | 14 | 9 | 22 |
| 4 |  ArsenalArsenal | 12 | 6 | 4 | 2 | 21 | 12 | 9 | 22 |
| 5 |  BrightonBrighton | 12 | 6 | 4 | 2 | 21 | 16 | 5 | 22 |
Alan Shearer’s ‘worrying’ Man City claim
Former England campaign Alan Shearer feels City are in uncharted territory when it comes to this current run of form, as he listed a host of issues that they have been unable to do with.
“They’ve got Feyenoord in the Champions League on Tuesday evening,” he said on The Rest is Football podcast. “So they’re going to have to bounce back in that game and somehow try and pick up a little bit of confidence, which is what they need to do, to go to Anfield next Sunday.
“So yeah, there’s a lot of things and we, I don’t think we’ve ever said that. There’s a lot of things that are wrong in the team at this moment in time. The pressing, the protection for the back four, too many players losing 1v1 battles.
“Haaland missed big chances again. Very similar to what happened against Sporting Lisbon. Haaland had some really, really good chances, didn’t score them, then the team’s under pressure.”
“So, that has to change. We’re saying things about this Man City team that we’ve never said before, which there’s no doubt is a worrying sign.”
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Erling Haaland’s struggles laid bare
Shearer is correct to raise Haaland’s lack of impact in front of goal when he talks about City’s struggles, with a look at the Norwegian’s recent goal return against his xG showing a significant disparity.
| Game | xG | Goals scored |
| Spurs (23/11) | 0.76 | 0 |
| Brighton (9/11) | 1.28 | 1 |
| Bournemouth (2/11) | 1.24 | 0 |
| Southampton (26/10) | 2.22 | 1 |
| Wolves (20/10) | 0 | 0 |
| Fulham (5/10) | 0.34 | 0 |
| Newcastle (28/9) | 0.43 | 0 |
| Total | 6.27 | 2 |
While the blame for City’s poor run should not be firmly put at the door of Haaland, the fact that he is underperforming his xG to such an extent – a return of two goals from an xG of 6.27 in the last seven Premier League games – cannot be ignored, even if he did score four times on international duty, including what the Norwegian media called ‘merciless’ performance.
Given the nature of xG and the quality that Haaland possesses, Guardiola and City will be hoping that this reverts to the mean in the coming weeks, with Sunday’s trip to Anfield the perfect place to start.
