Erling Haaland stat is a bigger worry than Arsenal’s reliance on set pieces

Much has been made of Arsenal being overly reliant on goals from set pieces this season, but Manchester City are even more reliant on Erling Haaland.

The Norway international has been in fantastic form this season, scoring 15 goals in his first 12 games in all competitions.

In the Premier League, he has 11 in 9 games, and stats show that’s 65% of Man City’s total goals scored.

See below as Squawka claim Haaland’s goals account for almost two thirds of the goals scored by Pep Guardiola’s side in the league so far this season, which is impressive, but perhaps far from ideal if he ever has an occasional bad game, as we saw with City’s defeat away to Aston Villa last weekend…

Erling Haaland has scored 65% of Man City’s Premier League goals this season.

Pep Guardiola’s system has made him more central than ever and the numbers show why. ?

— Squawka (@Squawka) October 31, 2025

City weren’t at their best last season as they slipped to third in the Premier League table, and at the time it seemed like the long-term injury to Rodri was one of the major factors affecting their form.

Still, they now seem to be overly reliant on Haaland more than anyone, with other star names like Phil Foden and Jeremy Doku arguably just not delivering enough end-product consistently in this MCFC attack.

It’s hard to see where else the goals could come from in Guardiola’s squad, as he no longer has the likes of Kevin De Bruyne and Ilkay Gundogan to rely on like he did in the past.

At the same time, Arsenal could really do with an elite goal-scorer like Haaland in their side, with Viktor Gyokeres only scoring three Premier League goals so far.

The Gunners rely a lot on Gabriel Magalhaes heading in their corners and free-kicks, and it’s perhaps hard to see them sustaining that over an entire campaign.

It will be interesting to see Arsenal and City going for the title with these flaws in place, even if they’re both generally very strong teams.

It should make for an intriguing title race, but does it perhaps mean neither club will quite have enough to go all the way in the Champions League?

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