Man City U18s copy Pep Guardiola's Erling Haaland tactic to book FA Youth Cup semi-final at Arsenal

If you believe the critics, Manchester City have an Erling Haaland problem this season.

Despite 33 goals already, Haaland has apparently joined the wrong club, and City are no better with the striker, who is being criticised for 'only' scoring goals. His build-up play is improving, but not enough for some.

Pep Guardiola doesn't buy into that narrative, though, and seems to be enjoying the challenge of integrating a player of Haaland's qualities into his possession-based side. On the evidence of City's FA Youth Cup quarter-final win over Oxford on Tuesday, it seems the academy is successfully deploying a similar system that saw them set up a tantalising semi-final at Arsenal.

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"If you watch any of our sides play from under-nines to the first team, hopefully it doesn't look that dissimilar in terms of the style and product that's on offer," under-18 coach Ben Wilkinson told MEN Sport before this quarter-final. "We try and play in the same way as the standards the first team set."

Wilkinson also wanted City to deal with the pressure of an expectant home crowd, rather than a 'hostile' away one that the under-19s experienced at Hajduk Split last week in the UEFA Youth League defeat, and it would be up to the five starters from the defeat in Croatia - and the seven substitutes - to help their younger colleagues through this tricky test against Oxford.

With a solid back four, and no sign of an inverted full-back that the senior team have deployed of late, City unsurprisingly took control of the tie with the ball. Gatlin O'Donkor's warning shot was way wide and was the only chance of note in an opening where City were moving Oxford