'Life is not easy' - Haaland penalty miss sums up Man City crisis

Nothing seems to be going Manchester City's way at the moment - and star striker Erling Haaland is not a happy man.

If there was any player currently in the Premier League you would hand the ball to for a penalty to win a match, it would be the prolific Norwegian. Not on this occasion, though.

Looking to land a knockout blow, Haaland saw his second-half strike saved by spot-kick expert Jordan Pickford, as Manchester City's crisis continued with a 1-1 draw against Everton at Etihad Stadium.

"How do you react mentally?" asked boss Pep Guardiola about the penalty miss. "Life is not easy. Sport is not easy. When it happens, it is OK.

"There are still a lot of minutes to play and we had the chances afterwards. We created, incredible how they ran and fight. In some games it was not good but today well played."

At the full-time whistle, there were a smattering of boos from home supporters at Etihad Stadium and a despondent Haaland ripped off his hair bobble and shirt before heading straight down the tunnel.

As Haaland trudged off out of sight, Guardiola stood motionless on the pitch with the look of a man unable to find answers to their current crisis.

City's all-conquering side have suffered a remarkable drop-off and now won just once in their last 13 games in all competitions.

In the post-match news conference, the stunned Spaniard was barely audible in the responses to the questions fired his way.

"My body language was positive," he uttered. "The team played really good. We had I don't know how many shots. The first half was brilliant."

City have a lengthy injury list, but their downturn has coincided with Haaland's struggles in front of goal.

The striker made a blistering start to the campaign looked to be on his way to setting more goalscoring records when netting 10 goals in his first five games, but has only managed three in 13 since.

This has largely been down to underperformance on his expected goal (xG) rate, with statistics showing he has scored five fewer goals than he should have done during this recent run.

There is also a stark contrast from his shot conversion rate from the first five games to his last 13, dropping from 38.5% to a lowly 6.4%.

The penalty miss was Haaland's only shot on target in the contest - but Everton did not set out to pay him extra attention.

Asked if there had been a special plan to handle the frontman, Dyche said: "No. I was asked the other day when playing Chelsea about Cole Palmer and what a great player he is turning out to be.

"We know Haaland is too but I believe in the team. I don't look at one aspect of it, I look at the team, what they are doing and they have done a good job today."