{"id":20277,"date":"2024-10-27T12:48:51","date_gmt":"2024-10-27T12:48:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/?p=20277"},"modified":"2024-10-27T12:49:09","modified_gmt":"2024-10-27T12:49:09","slug":"epl-haaland-fires-man-city-to-top-of-premier-league-villa-held","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/?p=20277","title":{"rendered":"EPL: Haaland fires Man City to top of Premier League, Villa held"},"content":{"rendered":"

Erling Haaland fired Manchester City to the top of the Premier League as the striker sealed a 1-0 win against Southampton, while third-placed Aston Villa were frustrated by Bournemouth\u2019s last-gasp leveller on Saturday.<\/span><\/p>\n

Haaland had gone three league games without a goal, but he ended that mini drought in the first half at the Etihad Stadium.<\/span><\/p>\n

That was enough to lift Pep Guardiola\u2019s side into first place, two points ahead of second-placed Liverpool, who can regain pole position if they win Sunday\u2019s blockbuster clash with title rivals Arsenal.<\/span><\/p>\n

City have not lost a league game at the Etihad for two years, a run encompassing 35 games, and bottom-of-the-table Southampton, who have only one point from nine games this season, were never likely to shatter that impressive streak.<\/span><\/p>\n

With Jack Grealish and Jeremy Doku ruled out, Guardiola made four changes to the team that thrashed Sparta Prague in the Champions League on Wednesday.<\/span><\/p>\n

Haaland had scored an audacious goal against Sparta, and while his effort to kill off Southampton was more prosaic, it was arguably far more valuable given the context of a tense title race.<\/span><\/p>\n

Matheus Nunes\u2019s cross reached Haaland in the fifth minute, and the Norwegian showed strength and desire to get to the ball ahead of his marker for a close-range strike.<\/span><\/p>\n

City spurned several chances to increase their lead, but Haaland\u2019s 14th goal in all competitions this season gave the unbeaten champions seven wins from nine league matches as they chase a fifth successive title.<\/span><\/p>\n

Aston Villa\u2019s hopes of pushing for the title suffered a setback as Bournemouth snatched a 1-1 draw at Villa Park.<\/span><\/p>\n

Villa are unbeaten in the Champions League, sitting at the top of the table after seeing off Young Boys, Bayern Munich, and Bologna.<\/span><\/p>\n

But they couldn\u2019t follow their latest European success with a domestic victory despite taking the lead in the 76th minute.<\/span><\/p>\n

Ian Maatsen crossed, and Leon Bailey teed up Ross Barkley to hook in his first goal for the club.<\/span><\/p>\n

But Evanilson rescued Bournemouth with the headed equaliser six minutes into stoppage time.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u2022 Wolves Fightback \u2013<\/span><\/p>\n

Brentford beat fourth-bottom Ipswich 4-3 in a thrilling clash in west London.<\/span><\/p>\n

Ipswich\u2019s Sam Szmodics produced a fine finish from 15 yards in the 28th minute before George Hirst clipped a composed strike past Mark Flekken three minutes later.<\/span><\/p>\n

But Yoane Wissa netted in the 44th minute, and Harry Clarke\u2019s own goal seconds later hauled Brentford level.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bryan Mbeumo\u2019s 51st-minute penalty, awarded for Clarke\u2019s foul on Keane Lewis-Potter, put Brentford 3-2 up.<\/span><\/p>\n

Capping a miserable day for Clarke, he was sent off in the closing stages after fouling Lewis-Potter to earn a second booking.<\/span><\/p>\n

Liam Delap\u2019s 86th-minute equaliser appeared to have spared Clarke\u2019s blushes, but Mbeumo snatched victory with the last kick of stoppage time.<\/span><\/p>\n

Second-bottom Wolves staged a superb fightback to draw 2-2 at fifth-placed Brighton.<\/span><\/p>\n

Danny Welbeck bagged his sixth goal of the season in first-half stoppage time, and Evan Ferguson struck with a clinical finish from Tariq Lamptey\u2019s 85th-minute cross to leave Brighton in control.<\/span><\/p>\n

But Rayan Ait-Nouri got one back three minutes later, and Matheus Cunha saved winless Wolves from a sixth successive league defeat with a deflected equaliser deep into stoppage time.<\/span><\/p>\n

Everton face Fulham in Saturday\u2019s late game at Goodison Park.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Erling Haaland fired Manchester City to the top of the Premier League as the striker sealed a 1-0 win against Southampton, while third-placed Aston Villa were frustrated by Bournemouth\u2019s last-gasp leveller on Saturday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20278,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[223,3456,1592,812,4354],"class_list":["post-20277","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-epl","tag-erling-haaland","tag-man-city","tag-premier-league","tag-villa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20277"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20277"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20277\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20279,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20277\/revisions\/20279"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/20278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20277"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20277"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20277"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}