Haaland back among goals with double as Man City beat Everton
Manchester, England - Erling Haaland scored his first goals in 77 days as Manchester City battled their way past Everton 2-0 to go top for the first time since mid-november.
Everton had worked hard to restrict the champions to no shots on target until Haaland broke the deadlock in the 71st minute before being set up by substitute Kevin De Bruyne for the second 14 minutes later.
It took Haaland’s tally this season to a league-leading 16 goals as City claimed their 10th consecutive win in all competitions and a run of six in the league.
City made four changes from the side that beat Brentford on Monday. John Stones and Manuel Akanji replaced Kyle
Walker and Josko Gvardiol in defence, while Jeremy Doku and Matheus Nunes replaced the benched De Bruyne and Bernardo Silva.
In his 300th Premier League match, Sean Dyche, who had to watch from the stands because of a ban, named an unchanged side from their 2-2 draw with Tottenham Hotspur.
The visitors nearly caught Man City by surprise. Dwight Mcneil slipped through Ben Godfrey, but the defender’s sliding attempt was claimed by Ederson as both players collided.
Thereafter the half was dominated by City, but they struggled to create chances past a deep and resolute Everton defence. They had nine shots in the first half, of which five were blocked, but none was on target, for the first time since January 2023.
It was their most shots without hitting the target in the opening 45 minutes of a Premier League match since November 2019 when they had 14 against Southampton.