Manchester City’s 2-0 defeat to Bayer Leverkusen on Tuesday night not only ended their perfect Champions League start, but also showed how vulnerable their attack is without Erling Haaland.
Pep Guardiola opted to drop Haaland from the starting XI and gave Omar Marmoush the number 9 role. Marmoush lasted 65 minutes, failing to register a single shot and struggling to impose himself at any stage of City’s attack.
At the final whistle, the performance had reinforced a suspicion that had been growing for weeks: Manchester City rely incredibly heavily on Erling Haaland.
Haaland xG Shows Extreme Overreliance
Haaland is on course for his most prolific goal-scoring season, accounting for more than 56% of Manchester City’s non-penalty xG (npxG) this season. This is an unprecedented number for the five best leagues in Europe.
For context, the highest npxG share since 2017 by a title-winning side is 35%, in Robert Lewandowski’s 41-goal Bundesliga season. Haaland is on 57.5%, almost double his own usage rate since City’s title win in 2022/23.
Erling Haaland has accounted for 57.5% of Manchester City’s npxG this season (based on current NPxG totals after twelve Premier League games).
This is not normal variance, nor simply a striker in form. This is systemic. Creating chances across town to Haaland at a level that the top teams rarely approach.
The match against Leverkusen was the first real stress test of that system without him – and the results were grim.
City’s attack without Haaland
Against Leverkusen, Marmoush found himself isolated, unable to threaten at the back and rarely touching the ball in dangerous areas.
He finished with zero shots, zero xG and just three touches in the opponent’s penalty area.
City produced only low-value half-chances until Haaland came in, tightening the structure somewhat but failing to save the game.
The game provided the clearest evidence yet that City’s attacking identity is now built around Haaland to an extent that leaves them exposed when he is absent or even locked up.
How to stop Man City – Stop Haaland
The defeat in Leverkusen comes after a Premier League loss to Newcastle, which provided a similar blueprint in stopping Man City.
Center back Malick Thiaw put in a great performance, following Haaland aggressively, limiting touches to his feet and denying him space to turn.
Without Haaland’s gravity, City created little. Phil Foden produced a few moments of quality, but neither was part of a sustained attacking pattern.
This is a structural problem. Haaland wears Man City. If he can’t dictate to the box, they’ll miss other sources of recording volume.
How Haaland takes Man City’s attackers to the next level
Take Phil Foden for example. Foden’s trademark shots from the edge of the box are usually created by Haaland drawing multiple defenders into the box.
Take out Haaland, and Foden gets fewer second balls and shoots less, and the team loses its dual-threat dynamic.
For all of Jeremy Doku’s improvements, he is averaging just 1.2 shots per 90, but his expected assists have risen because so many of his dribbles end in cuts to Haaland. He generates danger, but not on his own, no matter how unplayable he can be.
Marmoush’s threat only increases when Haaland occupies defenders. Cherki’s ball carrying becomes more dangerous when Haaland makes counter runs. Savio is one of the few strikers with a natural shot profile, but he is not integrated enough to become a reliable option.
City have drifted away from wide attackers who create their own shots, such as Raheem Sterling, Riyad Mahrez and Gabriel Jesus. And what remains is a single-threat attack structure, with enormous benefits, but also great risks.
Can Manchester City win the Premier League by relying solely on Haaland?
History says that teams with this level of usage of one goal scorer don’t win league titles.
Even Lewandowski’s 41-goal season came in a Bayern team that generated mountains of xG everywhere. The city is not that dominant. Not this year.
They find themselves in a much more competitive league, where the games are tighter, the margins smaller, where tactical unpredictability matters, and, perhaps most importantly, where injuries define seasons.
If Haaland is injured in the medium term, which is not an unlikely scenario given his size, explosiveness and sprint volume, City will need an entirely different attacking structure.
The version we saw against Leverkusen and Newcastle doesn’t look appropriate.
Is Guardiola deliberately relying on an over-reliance on Haaland?
There has clearly been a tactical change. City is less busy. They counter more. They rely on early balls into space.
This style plays to Haaland’s superhuman powers, especially in transition, and will net him a ton of goals, as we have already seen this season. But how do they do that without him?
Did you know that Erling Haaland reached a top speed of 34.42 km/h when he scored against Arsenal this weekend? 💨 pic.twitter.com/Y3S5eXTXpw
— Premier League (@premierleague) September 24, 2025
Instead of running a multi-threat attack, Guardiola has doubled down on the supercharger Haaland.
It can still work. But it makes City more vulnerable than at any time in his tenure.
Haaland can stay fit all season and end this season with 45 or 50 goals. But the principle remains: it’s a huge risk for an elite club to build an entire attacking identity around one player.
Certainly not in the Premier League. Especially not over 60 games. Certainly not if injuries are unavoidable.
The city has the resources and ability to build squads to create sustainable systems that survive absences. They’ve done it before.
However, this version of City feels like the opposite: a team that works brilliantly with Haaland but looks worryingly ordinary without him.
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