Jordan Pickford's old school antics were too much for damaged Erling Haaland and Man City
Share:
To be fair, it is sometimes hard to know whether or not Jordan Pickford is deliberately pulling a funny face. The England keeper is permanently animated. But his pre-penalty antics in Everton’s draw at the Etihad had their roots in old-school gamesmanship.
Sticking a tongue out at your spot-kick adversary is hardly sophisticated mind games but, then again, nothing too cerebral is needed to distract Erling Haaland nowadays. And in truth, had Pickford been wearing a cap, he could have thrown it on Haaland’s lamentable effort from 12 yards.
Had Pickford gone the wrong way, Haaland’s penalty might just about have made it to the back of the net. The Norwegian’s tame penalty was the perfect emblem of the malaise that has taken hold of the Premier League in the past two months. But it was a moment that Pickford could rightly savour.
That is two in a row he has saved and he has now conceded only seven goals in his last 11 Premier League appearances. The seventh of those - one that earned City a point - was an early Bernardo Silva effort that took, from the home team’s point of view, a very fortunate deflection.
Penalty save aside, Pickford did not have a significant amount of serious work to do, such is City’s staggering dearth of confidence, but what he had to do, he did well, and his distribution was fairly exemplary. In a strictly mediocre game, Pickford had a touch of quality. Clearly, the headline theme from this contest was City’s continuing charge into ordinariness. Fair enough. But Everton, in recent matches, have taken points from Chelsea, Arsenal and City.
