Man City wastefulness vs Aston Villa shows not even Erling Haaland can stop inevitable problem

Manchester City's 1-1 draw with Aston Villa on Saturday had a familiar feeling to it. Not because of the result itself — after all, City had won 14 of their previous 16 league meetings with Villa — but because of the manner in which it came about.

It was the kind of performance we saw a few times last season, particularly in the spring when Liverpool reduced City's lead at the top of the table from 14 points (with two games in hand) to one. Pep Guardiola's side were not at their brilliant best, but for large parts of the game they were pretty good.

When Kevin de Bruyne crossed to the back post and Erling Haaland found himself in acres of space to score the opener, City seemed to spark into life. They played their best football of the game in the 25 minutes that followed, awoken from their first half slumber by a goal that came from nothing.

READ MORE: Man City players take Pep Guardiola instruction too far at Aston Villa

But City created chances aplenty; between the 64th and 71st minutes, four chances came and went. Haaland pulled two fine stops out of Emiliano Martinez while De Bruyne hit the crossbar with a wicked free-kick before riffling a snap-shot just wide.

City were pummelling Villa by this point, but they just couldn't score. In 74th minute Leon Bailey equalised for the hosts and 1-1 is how the scoreline stayed. Over the 90 minutes City had 13 shots — four of which were on target and four of which were classed as big chances. City recorded an expected goals rating of 2.1 compared to Villa's 0.34, but they returned to Manchester with just a point.

City dropping points after wasting plenty of chances to kill off the game... sounds familiar, right? Liverpool at home and away (both 2-2), Crystal Palace (0-0),