Erling Haaland (£15.5m) netted a controversial winner for Manchester City, despite having to play with 10-men from the 23rd minute onwards.
While it wasn’t a classic, the Manchester derby certainly provided plenty of talking points.
Here are our Scout Notes from the game.
MARESCA ON HAALAND
After a quiet first-half, Haaland struck his ninth derby goal on the hour mark.
The Norwegian finished superbly from Josko Gvardiol’s (£5.7m) cross, although Enzo Fernandez (£6.9m) looked like he interfered in the play from an offside position. The goal was initially ruled out, before VAR overturned the decision.
However, in a huge “error of judgement”, refereeing body Pro Ref later admitted their mistake.
As for Haaland, he moved up from two to three bonus in the late Opta update, taking his points tally to 31 over his last three matches.
In his post-match presser, Enzo Maresca discussed Haaland and the need to rest him at some point.
“Erling since he came back from the World Cup is working very good, for sure. We need to think to give him some rest at some point because, you know, after the World Cup, he cannot continue in the same way all season.
“But in this moment, we are happy with his performance. Then the most important thing is that he is happy. You can see the mood he is happy. Not only today but even the day-by-day, the training sessions, and as much as we keep Erling happy, we are all happy.
“How do you say it in English? Happy wife, happy life? We say happy Erling, happy life!” – Enzo Maresca on Erling Haaland
For Haaland’s owners, hopefully that rest arrives on Thursday, when Man City play Norwich City in the EFL Cup, three days before they face Sunderland at home in Gameweek 5.
FODEN BANNED, CHERKI TAKEN OFF AT HALF-TIME
Maresca made just one change from the midweek Champions League win over Porto, with Elliot Anderson (£6.3m) coming into the midfield. Ayyoub Bouaddi (£5.5m) made way.
In an attacking line-up, Anderson partnered Enzo in the middle of the park, with Phil Foden (£7.0m), Rayan Cherki (£7.8m) and Antoine Semenyo (£8.4m) behind Haaland.
Nico O’Reilly (£6.4m) meanwhile was on the bench.
But City’s plans were turned upside down in the 23rd minute, when Foden was shown a straight red card for violent conduct after kicking out at Bruno Fernandes (£12.0m). He’ll subsequently miss that aforementioned EFL Cup tie due to suspension, as well as Gameweeks 5 and 6.
With City having to defend resolutely, Maresca took Cherki off at half-time, replacing him with Iliman Ndiaye (£5.9m).
“Rayan Cherki is a top player but, in that moment, we needed something different. We needed a player that could win fouls, can counter-attack and the idea was in the second half with Iliman on one side, Antoine on the other side and then Erling, when we had the chance to attack we need to attack, we cannot just defend.” – Enzo Maresca
City were the better team in the second-half even with 10 men…
While City defended very well, they could also have scored further goals.
Haaland went close after his opener, while a shot from Enzo was pushed onto the post by Senne Lammens (£4.9m).
GVARDIOL THE TOP-SCORING DEFENDER
After his assist, clean sheet and maximum bonus haul on Sunday, Gvardiol is now the top-scoring defender in FPL.
With 33 points in total, he’s produced an attacking return in three of his four matches.
Also, while the defensive structure certainly isn’t perfect at City right now, it is improving, having delivered three clean sheets in a row across all competitions.
On the defensive contributions (DefCon) front, Anderson and Matheus Nunes (£5.9m) both banked DefCon points in the derby, as well as Patrick Dorgu (£5.8m) and Kobbie Mainoo (£5.5m) from United.
Ndiaye wasn’t far off either, despite playing only 45 minutes of football.
Mainoo is averaging 14.35 DefCons per 90 minutes this season, having hit the threshold in each of his three starts.
UNITED ATTACK POOR
It was far too comfortable in the end for City.
United carried very little threat going forward, with the home side somehow worse after Foden was sent off.
Michael Carrick’s men did hit the post twice through Marcus Rashford (£7.0m) and Mainoo. Bryan Mbeumo (£7.9m) was also denied late on by a superb Gianluigi Donnarumma (£5.5m) save.
However, United didn’t have the quality to break City down, with just three shots on target all afternoon.
It’s not a coincidence, but Fernandes was poor too, with only one attempt on goal and one chance created.
The Red Devils do at least have a couple of matches to put it right before the international break, with Brighton and Hove Albion up first in the EFL Cup on Wednesday, before Sunday’s trip to Fulham.
SHAW INJURY LATEST
Finally, Luke Shaw (£4.4m) wasn’t risked in the Champions League on Thursday, and he wasn’t fit to feature here, either.
Carrick told Sky Sports that he was “very close” to playing but “not quite there”.
A positive update, then, which suggests Shaw will be back soon.
