Pep Guardiola explains early Erling Haaland substitution amid injury fears

Pep Guardiola revealed Erling Haaland was taken off as a precaution in Manchester City’s 3-0 win over Fulham having complained of discomfort after scoring a goal that moved him level with Colin Bell in the club’s scoring charts.

Haaland got the third of the night, his 153rd goal for the club to move joint fourth all-time for City, following goals from Antoine Semenyo and Nico O’Reilly.

But Haaland was then replaced at half-time by Omar Marmoush with City cruising towards a win that moved them to within three points of Premier League leaders Arsenal.

“Niggles,” Guardiola said when asked why Haaland was withdrawn. “Some problems, he feels uncomfortable. It was 3-0 of course. The reason why? Many games…

“I didn’t speak with the doctors, I don’t know exactly what he has. Just fatigue or something.”

An injury to their star forward would be the only potential blemish on an otherwise straightforward night for City, who did not need to move too far out of second gear against a disappointing Fulham side who lost for the fourth time in five to lose more ground in the fight for Europe.

Semenyo scored his fifth goal in eight games for City to get things started before teeing up the excellent O’Reilly to get the second in another fine performance from the January signing.

“He has incredible skills and he is so open-minded and generous in the effort,” Guardiola said of the Ghana winger. “He has an incredible sense of goal for the chaos of second goals. Really good.”

Semenyo had wanted a penalty shortly before the third goal, having claimed his hair was pulled when he went up for a corner.

“I went to attack the corner and I just felt a tug on my hair, obviously let the referee know,” Semenyo said. “They checked it and said there wasn’t enough. Just left it as that, really…”

Arsenal have the opportunity to respond to City’s win when they face Brentford on Thursday, and Guardiola was not interested in discussing the league standings.

“We were not nine points (behind) before Anfield (on Sunday), we are not three points (ahead) before Brentford v Arsenal,” he said. “After that we will see. I always say the focus is to grow, grow, grow.

“It’s how we can be more consistent over 90 minutes, how we can be better and the players feel that (they are) doing what we want to do.”

Fulham extended their own miserable record against City, having suffered 20 consecutive defeats in all competitions.

Boss Marco Silva said: “Not good enough. We have to be humble enough to congratulate our opponent. Definitely, City was better than us. Simple as that.

“But looking for us, with all the focus more on ourselves, we are not at the level for the demands of a game like this one. We have to put (more) on the pitch, definitely…

“The first goal, we tried to make a clearance of the ball, but instead of the ball going in the right direction it went to Semenyo. The way we are not capable of stopping the counter-attack in the second goal as well. That is two against one on Haaland and we have to do better in that moment.”