The Bees’ ground down by the River Thames was one of only two Premier League venues Haaland had not previously scored at.
Haaland scored the only goal as Manchester City won at Brentford (Steven Paston/PA)open image in gallery
Haaland scored the only goal as Manchester City won at Brentford (Steven Paston/PA) (PA Wire)
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Erling Haaland ticked the Gtech Stadium off his to-do list by firing Manchester City to a 1-0 win at Brentford.
The Bees’ ground down by the River Thames was one of only two Premier League venues Haaland had not previously scored at, but he put that to rights with a trademark strike.
Just eight minutes had elapsed when the Norwegian striker raced on to a ball over the top from Josko Gvardiol.
Haaland bulldozed his way between Bees defenders Sepp van den Berg and Nathan Collins before lashing his shot past Caoimhin Kelleher.
It was Haaland’s 18th goal in 11 matches for club and country this season and leaves Anfield as the only ground he has yet to score at in the Premier League.
His ninth league goal of the campaign also took City boss Pep Guardiola to 250 wins in the competition, a landmark reached in just 349 matches – the previous quickest manager to reach that milestone was Arsene Wenger in a comparatively pedestrian 423 games.
Sadly, City’s afternoon in the west London sunshine was soured when midfielder Rodri suffered more injury misery.
In the 20th minute the disconsolate Spaniard, still making his way back from almost a year out due to an ACL injury, sat down in the centre circle holding his hamstring and eventually limped off to be replaced by Nico Gonzalez.
Phil Foden has six goals in his last three appearances at Brentford and he had another in his sights after being teed up by Tijjani Reijnders, but he drove his shot straight at Kelleher.
City dominated the first half and Foden struck another decent opportunity wide before Reijnders forced a fine reaction save from Kelleher.
Brentford offered nothing in response. Now managed by their former set-piece coach Keith Andrews, they proceeded to make a complete mess of the only two free-kicks they won in threatening positions.
Even a long throw attempt by Michael Kayode went wrong, with referee Darren England awarding a foul throw.
Yet they should have been level two minutes into the second half after Gvardiol misjudged a headed clearance and Igor Thiago charged through on goal.
But the Brazilian, who scored twice in the win over Manchester United last weekend, could not repeat the trick as his tame effort was blocked by Gianluigi Donnarumma.
The City keeper was barely troubled again until, in the last minute, his clearance was charged down by Kevin Schade.
Fortunately for Donnarumma the ball ran out of play as City held on to stretch their unbeaten run to seven matches and climb up to fifth in the table ahead of the international break.