Martin O’Neill has slammed the recent criticism aimed towards one specific Manchester City player.
After drawing 0-0 against Arsenal in the Premier League last weekend, one City player found himself on the end of some significant praise for the way he plays.
Now though, one pundit and former top-flight manager has shared his thoughts on the matter and shared his dismay at what has been said about the City star.
O’Neill frustrated by criticism of Man City star
Speaking on talkSPORT, O’Neill had this to say about Erling Haaland and the recent criticism that has been coming his way, including how few touches he tends to have in games.
He said: “I happen to think Erling Haaland is probably the best striker in the world. I’m not into that at all about the number of touches he has or hasn’t had in the game.
“He’s a brilliant, brilliant striker, he scores goals for fun. It’s the hardest thing in the world to do, scoring goals and he does them in multiple numbers. He’s fantastic, he’s the best in the world.
“Just because sometimes the ball is laid up to him he may not control it immediately, and that’s not to often, Manchester City play in a different sort of way and if the team is content for him to just finish things off, that’s fine.
“This number of touches, it does my brain in when I see the stat coming up that Erling Haaland has only had five touches and he’s only scored four goals in the five touches, it does my brain in.”
With 24 Premier League appearances to his name this season, the striker has had 481 touches of the ball in total, leaving only four outfield players currently in the City squad with fewer.
While the Norwegian may not be particularly prominent in term of how often he gets on the ball, he has still been able to score 18 goals across his 24 league appearances.
In response to Roy Keane’s comments likening Haaland to a League Two player, Pep Guardiola described the 23-year-old as the best striker in the world, as O’Neill now has.
This shows that the City boss, also like O’Neill, has no issue with the way Haaland plays in terms of not having too many touches of the ball.
Moving forward, we feel that this criticism only came out because the striker didn’t score against Arsenal. Therefore, if Haaland can get back to scoring goals on a regular basis, any doubts about his ability will disappear.