Erling Haaland issue solved in minutes - but Joao Cancelo exposes bigger Man City problem

Phil Foden, Ilkay Gundogan, Jeremy Doku and now Bernardo Silva. Manchester City have scored inside the opening 10 minutes in each of their four Club World Cup games and none of them have been scored by Erling Haaland.

City's No.9 would rather have the lion's share, yet part of his struggles last season came from the fact none of his teammates could be relied upon to score. Looking down from his 31 goals, Phil Foden with 10 was the only other Blue to reach double figures.

It wasn't just a goal problem either, it was a performance problem. Opposition teams learned that Haaland was the only goal threat and so adapted accordingly, marking him out of the game confident in the knowledge that this would mean they kept a clean sheet; too often, they were right.

To watch City in the Club World Cup has been to draw a line in the sand on last season and start to celebrate a new era. More than £275million of signings have been made in 2025 and those players are already doing the job of providing more competition for places.

It can only be a good thing to see City attack so slickly against Al Hilal in the last-16 then, given how often they battled so unsuccessfully against defensive teams last season. Multiple players crashing into the box helped to take the burden from Haaland and surprise opponents who had grown used to an overreliance on the Norwegian.

The FIFA Club World Cup will see 32 of the world's best club teams including Man City, Chelsea, Real Madrid, PSG and Bayern Munich play across 63 games from June 14-July 13.

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Even when he did score, it again pointed to an alternative source of goals. Haaland prodded in a corner as Nathan Ake lurked as the new