In the early morning of November 10, the third round of the English League Cup kicks off, and Manchester City will host Chelsea. In a pre-match press conference, Pep Guardiola said Norwegian centre Haaland is still not fully recovered and whether he can play in the early hours of tomorrow morning has not yet been determined. However, at the same time, the coach also revealed a little unpleasant news for Manchester City fans, that is, before the start of the World Cup, Haaland will accept the call for the Norwegian national team and is likely to play at least one of the warm-up games.
It is worth mentioning that the Norwegian team did not qualify for the World Cup, and the two warm-up matches before the World Cup were not within the time stipulated by FIFA, so Manchester City could completely refuse Norway's recruitment to keep Haaland in the team. What's more, Haaland has not fully recovered from his health now, and if he is injured in this warm-up game, it will be too much to lose.
In this regard, Norwegian national team coach Salba said. He had previously communicated with Haaland and knew that the physical condition of the players was still unstable. But he won't give up and still try to get him to play at least one game. In other words, he knows Haaland is injured, but so what, he still has to play the national team warm-up game.
This approach is easily reminiscent of England manager Gareth Southgate. In November 2017, he knew United centre-back Phil Jones was injured but still let him play against Germany, which had been followed by six shots but was replaced after only 25 minutes. It was since then that Jones has changed from a genius centre-back who is infinitely favored to a famous glass man. In the previous five seasons, Jones had played just 40 games in all competitions for Manchester United. Jones, who has not yet expired with Manchester United, has disappeared from the squad and failed to transfer this summer due to health. It seems that at only 30 years old, his career will come to an end.
At the time, Mourinho lashed out at Southgate for forcing Jones to play friendly matches, saying he had "never heard of anything like this". However, in the UEFA Nations League in September, Southgate made a similar move, giving British star Harry Kane the start when England were hopeless, even if the latter collided with his opponent in the second half and caused a nose and mouth bleed.
Now Norway manager Solba's plan is quite "styled" by Southgate. You must know that Haaland has a history of serious injuries, and after joining Manchester City this season, the Blue Moon Army and Pep Guardiola have used him carefully, rarely letting him play the full game, and any wind and grass will directly put him on the bench. Even when Haaland reported to the Norwegian national team, Manchester City sent a team doctor to accompany him, ready to provide him with medical protection. Now the Norwegian manager's approach is quite a bit of a "cub selling the grandfather field does not hurt".