The ongoing financial scandal enveloping Manchester City is not affecting the team’s results in the Premier League, nor has it diminished Erling Haaland’s appetite for goals. Playing in front of fans waving inflatable bananas, City became only the third team to open a Premier League season with seven straight wins by beating Ipswich 3-2 at home on Saturday. Haaland netted twice to move to a season-high eight goals for a campaign being played under a cloud of controversy.
That made it back-to-back victories in the league for City, either side of a 4-2 loss to Paris Saint-Germain in the Champions League, since being found guilty of large-scale financial wrongdoing in the Premier League for nearly a decade. The seismic verdict threatens the club’s place in England’s lucrative top flight, though City continue to protest their innocence and have appealed. City manager Enzo Maresca believes the saga has galvanised the squad, and the defiance among the fanbase continued, with many supporters bringing along inflatable bananas – a throwback to an item that fans brought to games in the 1980s for fun amid tough times for the team – for Ipswich’s visit.
They also jeered the Premier League anthem before kickoff. Haaland and second-half substitute Antoine Semenyo were seen hobbling off the field at the end of the game, which finished with Ipswich grabbing its second goal in stoppage time and piling on the pressure in the final minutes. The Norwegian has become the fastest player in Premier League history to score 100 non-penalty goals.
It took him 139 matches to achieve this record. Maresca said Haaland, who had taken a blow to the foot late in the match, was not worried. Maresca became the first manager to win his first seven Premier League games in charge of a team.
Earlier, Liverpool came from behind to win 2-1 at nine-man Brentford but lost two more players to injury in a busy stretch of fixtures. Trailing to Keane Lewis-Potter’s 44th-minute header, Liverpool found themselves with a man advantage when Brentford midfielder Yehor Yarmoliuk was shown a red card in first-half stoppage time for aiming a head-butt at Jeremy Jacquet. Liverpool took advantage, with Victor Munoz and Alexander Isak scoring after the break to consign Brentford to their first league defeat this season.
Vitaly Janelt became the second Brentford player to be sent off after getting a second yellow card in second-half stoppage time. Isak has just returned from an injury sustained on international duty with Sweden, but two players are back on the treatment table, with Dominik Szoboszlai and Jeremie Frimpong – a half-time substitute – forced off with injuries. Liverpool manager Andoni Iraola said Szoboszlai’s problem was the recurrence of the hamstring injury he got while playing for Hungary in the recent international break.
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