ERLING HAALAND claims he is to blame for Manchester City’s dismal slump.
The £51.4million Norwegian striker insists the players still have total faith in under-fire boss Pep Guardiola — despite a NINTH defeat in 12 games yesterday.
And City’s No 9 confessed: “I haven’t been good enough and haven’t delivered for City this season. I have to do better.
“I’m looking at myself, I haven’t been doing things good enough, I haven’t been scoring my chances. It’s not good enough from me.”
Haaland, 24, has scored a phenomenal 108 goals in 122 City games — but has found the net just once in his last six.
He added: “We’re not able to win matches any more, we can’t control them like we used to.
“We used to control them way more. But in defining moments I’m failing to score and I’ll do everything I can to turn this around.
“We know how important confidence is and it affects every human being.
“That is how it is, we have to stay positive even though it is difficult.”
This is the worst run of ex-Barcelona and Bayern Munich boss Guardiola’s entire managerial career.
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But Haaland added: “We still believe in him. He has won the Premier League six times in seven years, so we’ll never forget that.
“He will find the solutions. He has been doing that every single year.
“We have to work harder than ever. We just lost a game, another one.”
Defeat leaves the four-in-a-row champions sixth in the table — NINE points behind leaders Liverpool, who have TWO games in hand.
Goals from Jhon Duran and one-time Etihad hopeful Morgan Rogers put Villa two-up.
Before Phil Foden opened his account for the season with a late consolation goal.
Guardiola admits there is no defence for his side’s shocking form but does not blame Haaland.
He said: “I don’t agree with him. Without Erling we would be even worse.
“But I do like players to be that way. It’s our only chance to get better.
“There are two options — I judge myself, the only other situation is blame.
“I don’t agree with Erling as he tried and he needs to be delivered the ball in the right spots.
“I have never pointed at players in nine years because it would be easy for me to do that.
“We dropped as a team in the second half but not from any particular player.
“Now we must recover. We are struggling to score and are conceding goals.
“We don’t have a defence for it and the results are not good.
“It’s not about me, it’s about what we can do to get the results back.”
Villa chief Unai Emery admitted his side sensed City were low on self-belief.
He said: “We did fantastic with the chances we created. While the confidence was increasing for us, the confidence for them was going down.”
