He‘s going through a rough patch, which I think is an accumulation of various factors. He doesn‘t look fully fit to me - his movement is nowhere near as sharp as last year. And his confidence is down - he obviously knows he‘s struggling, and that‘s feeding back into his performances.
And he‘s suffering from the fact that we‘re simply nowhere near as incisive an attacking side this year. Maybe he is getting as many chances statistically, but the type and calibre of those chances are down - largely down to us losing Gundogan and De Bruyne being out for so long (and a shadow of his proper self when he has played). Last year, there was plenty of slow, controlled build up, but once we got through the first lines, those two were able to open up chances for Haaland with quick through balls, which we just haven’t really done this season - not Alvarez‘s game, not Bernardo‘s game, not even really Foden‘s game. Yes, he can do it, but his main strength as a 10 is as a goal scoring threat in his own right, not as a master creator like De Bruyne. This year, everything is funneled out to the wings and it all takes too long, allowing the opposition to get 10 players back in the box. Hard gig for any striker, especially when the quality of ball eventually coming in from the wings isn‘t especially high (Grealish, Doku and Bernardo aren’t great crossers, nor are Walker and Gvardiol).
I trust Pep to work things out for next season, and it wouldn‘t surprise me at all to see Haaland back to the performances/numbers of last year.
I also don‘t buy the ‚he‘s been found out‘ line. He‘s been putting up outrageous numbers for years, and opponents will have watched him to death before last season‘s games as well.
