Manchester City 3 Al-Hilal 4 (after extra-time)
The Club World Cup finally had its day of shocks – and none greater than Manchester City’s elimination to the Saudi Pro League side Al-Hilal, in the kind of defeat that will give Pep Guardiola great cause for concern as his team return to prepare for the new season.
Somehow, in this Gulf clash between Saudi’s most famous team and the English club owned by an Abu Dhabi royal, City conspired to come off worse over seven goals. The extra-time winner from the young Brazilian Marcos Leonardo, his second of the game, was just another example of how fragile City were defensively all night. A team that thrives on control were picked off on the counterattack again and again.
In the quarter-final in Orlando on Friday, Al-Hilal, having secured the greatest result in their history, will face Brazilians Fluminense who beat Inter Milan earlier in the day. The Europeans are starting to fall although it will be the nature of this defeat that will most trouble Guardiola. They have sacrificed a summer of rest to come to the United States and have not even made the last eight.
The returning midfielder Rodri came on in the second half as City went from a goal up to 2-1 behind, but he was later substituted himself. In his place came Phil Foden, who scored City’s second equaliser of the night at 3-3. Earlier, Erling Haaland had brought it back to 2-2. But after missing so many first half chances, City just looked strung out. There was not a moment after half-time when they did not look vulnerable on the break.
A stunning result for Al-Hilal’s new manager Simone Inzaghi, fresh from that hiding from PSG in last month’s Champions League final with Inter Milan. It was Inzaghi in charge of Inter too when they lost to City in the Champions League final two years previous. He certainly had the measure of City this time and unleashed his fast attackers to great effect.
An extraordinary game that looked early on like it would go according to expectations when Bernardo Silva scored in the ninth minute. City were lucky – a handball in the build-up by Rayan Ait-Nouri went unpunished by the Venezuelan referee Jesus Valenzuela Sáez.
It did not even seem to merit a VAR review and the Al-Hilal players were incensed. They appeared at one point to be refusing to restart the game. So much so that referee Valenzuela Sáez felt obliged to deliver an explanation in English over the stadium’s public address system – one that did not necessarily clear matters up.
Later, after Haaland’s equaliser he would inadvertently press the same switch again and broadcast his laboured breathing and abrupt instructions to his assistants for a few seconds.
City should have killed the tie in the first half. Savinho, Ilkay Gundogan and Jeremy Doku, his side’s most vibrant attacker, all had chances to do so. Guardiola had rested Rodri, Foden and Omar Marmoush from the starting XI and for a while it looked like this retooled City side would just be too strong. Al-Hilal’s goalkeeper, Yassine Bounou – Bono – one of Morocco’s 2022 World Cup heroes was superb.
But Inzaghi switched his side to a more confident counterattacking stance at half-time. He had spotted the high City line and, in particular, the struggles of Ruben Dias to match his quickest attackers. Inzaghi had two of those, the Brazilians Marcos Leonardo, a 22-year-old from Santos, and 28-year-old Malcom, once of Barcelona and well-travelled in Europe.
For eight minutes the pair of them tore City apart. It was Malcom who made the incursion for the equaliser and then the former City full-back Joao Cancelo who delivered the cross, eventually popping up for Leonardo to head in with Ederson stranded. Soon after Al-Hilal turned a City attacking corner into a surgical counter and Malcom went through to beat Ederson.
A remarkable turn of events, and although Haaland would equalise soon after, a finish at the second attempt in the box as the ball broke to him, City’s control would never be the same again. Dias would foul Malcom in another run through the middle that demonstrated the dysfunction in the City defence. The Brazilian was very marginally offside and it saved Dias. A superb recovery tackle on Malcom by the substitute Manuel Akanji just after the hour saved City.
Guardiola had made changes just before the second Al-Hilal goal – Akanji, Nathan Ake and Rodri all coming on. When the game went to extra-time, Guardiola would throw on Marmoush in place of Haaland and Rayan Cherki for Tijjani Reijnders.
Then later, behind once again, he substituted Rodri after 48 minutes to bring on Foden. City went behind early in extra-time. Ruben Neves’s corner headed in very gracefully by Kalidou Koulibaly, once briefly a Chelsea defender.
Foden got the equaliser but Al-Hilal were undeterred. It was Renan Lodi’s cross, headed on by Sergey Milinkovic-Savic that was finished by Leonardo.