Burnley 0-3 Manchester City: Erling Haaland’s first-half brace helps the Premier League champions get off to a perfect start against Vincent Kompany’s side at Turf Moor

Erling Haaland scored one goal with his first touch of the new season, a rather excellent second half an hour later and left the field at half-time for what appeared to be a very public lecture from his manager Pep Guardiola. Life at Manchester City goes on for Europe’s most talented striker.

Haaland and City started this season as they ended the last. By scoring and winning. The treble winners and defending champions of the Premier League will again have to take a break for the next nine months. By full-time, the impressive holding player Rodri had made three.

But Guardiola also remains unchanged, both in his expectations and in his idiosyncrasies. So even though he diverted SKY’s roaming camera in a curious pursuit of privacy, his conversation with Haaland as they made the long walk to the Turf Moor dressing room after 45 minutes was quite transparent in his coverage. It is now 54 goals in 55 for Haaland, but Guardiola still wants more.

Burnley, managed by Guardiola’s former City captain Vincent Kompany, opposed the game and were well into the game until Haaland scored the second goal, leaving City only able to keep them at bay afterwards.

There’s a little more style to Kompany’s version of Burnley than before. Whether they also possess the intelligence and survival instincts that have served them so well under Sean Dyche for so long remains to be seen.

There was only one downside for City and that was a muscle injury from Kevin de Bruyne. The Belgian was one of the Premier League players who warned of the risks of the schedule and now City will head to Athens without him for next Wednesday’s Super Cup meeting with Sevilla.

Other than that, this was as smooth as it gets for the champions and it always helps when your first attack of a new season leads to a goal.

Kompany will be somewhat angry about how easily his team was broken up. A De Bruyne cross from the right found Rodri peeling off Brazil’s Vitinho too easily and when he headed the ball back over the goal, Haaland beat three defenders to shoot the ball into the corner from seven yards out.

So far city. Although it wasn’t always easy for a while. Burnley – with five signings in the summer and only two of the players who started in the opening game of the Championship last season – were keen to impose themselves and were smart enough to find some space in and around the opposing team’s penalty area.

An early penalty claim for what appeared to be a tug by Manuel Akanji on Mohamed Zeki Amdouni was brushed off before Luca Koleosho curled a shot over the corner on the height of a handsome pass.

City was calm for a while. De Bruyne was replaced by Mateo Kovacic in the 22nd minute just after Amdouni passed Nathan Ake to work goalkeeper Ederson down the left. Rodri then made a crucial move to steal the ball from the same player before Lyle Foster curled a shot wide.

Turf Moor lived on optimism, but confidence can be dangerous and when Burnley defender Jordan Beyer got dispossessed when he cleared the ball from defense, City reused the ball to score a pretty fantastic second goal.

Kyle Walker and Phil Foden combined to the right and when the ball was delivered to Julian Alvarez he passed it off for Haaland to sweep a shot over Burnley’s former City keeper James Trafford and into the top corner with fairly unerring accuracy.

That was a really great goal that made Guardiola’s contribution to the half-time all the more unnecessary from a distance. But who are we to question a manager with so many trophies on his resume?

In the second half, City was largely at half strength. The only danger for them would have been a goal from Burnley. This was a home crowd ready to turn up the volume at any time.

But Kompany’s side looked to have lost a bit of their earlier vitality in the City half and hadn’t really threatened by the time Rodri picked up the pieces of a rather messy free-kick to score his team’s third goal with just over a quarter of a minute. hours left. With just five minutes added by referee Craig Pawson, the evening seemed over. But Burnley’s Belgian substitute Anass Zaroury was then sent off for a late tackle on Walker after Pawson was invited by his VAR colleagues to watch the monitor at the side of the pitch. In a strange way, that may have irritated Kompany as much as the result.

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