Guardiola: I want Haaland as close to the box as possible

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Manchester City F.C.

·27 febbraio 2026

Guardiola: I want Haaland as close to the box as possible

Pep Guardiola has reiterated that City’s tactics will always involve getting Erling Haaland in position to score as many goals as he can.

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The Norwegian started the 2025/26 in typically prolific fashion, scoring 19 times in our first 17 Premier League games.

He’s scored just three times in his last 10 league outings, but has recently taken to supplying team-mates, contributing three assists in our last four games.

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The No.9 drew special praise from Guardiola after last week’s victory over Newcastle for his work rate off the ball and in retaining possession.

While Guardiola is pleased to see Haaland doing the hard yards, he stated in no uncertain terms on Friday how he feels the striker can best help the team.

“Always I say to try and make Erling as close to the box to score goals,” he began in his press conference before Saturday’s trip to Leeds.

“There’s no more tactics than that, and the team to help him score goals, it depends on the team.

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“It’s really important [that he helps in the build up] but we have to try and use him as little as possible even with man marking.

“We have to make an alternative to long balls with Erling when he’s up against a player like [Newcastle’s Dan] Burn, otherwise every three days doing that for a striker like Erling, it’s not sustainable.

“We have to make an alternative so we still have a dream for him to play and play more, and with man marking that’s difficult.”

Undoubtedly one of the best players in the world, Haaland has developed on and off the pitch since first arriving at City in the summer of 2022.

On the way he’s helped us earn seven major honours including two Premier League titles and our maiden Champions League triumph.

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Haaland himself has been the Premier League’s Golden Boot winner twice and collected the PFA Player of the Year and Premier League Player of the Season amongst other gongs.

Despite that, Guardiola says the 25-year-old is still always keen to improve.

“I try to do my best for the players but the ones who play a lot of minutes normally do it for themselves,” he stated.

“After the games I don’t have to tell them what they’ve done, they experience it for themselves.

“I always said he’s a young player since he arrived, it depends on him in that case and how he can improve his game.”