Haaland is the league’s leading scorer with 26 goals, a tally that no City player has bettered since Francis Lee in 1972 and enough to win the Golden Boot in seven of the last ten seasons.
Since his hat-trick against Wolves in January, the No.9 has scored one in his last four Premier League games.
Bournemouth v City | Match preview
Speaking in his pre-match press conference on Friday, Guardiola rubbished suggestions that the Norwegian’s number of touches per match is having an impact on his overall contribution to the team.
“It’s our fault. Not Erling. Erling has been impressive all season,” he said.
“It’s not metrics, I don’t need metrics to know. When I finish the game one second later I know if he has been involved or not and who should be more involved or not. I don’t need numbers or metrics.”
WATCH: Guardiola expecting ‘intense’ Bournemouth clash
City played without a central striker in 2021/22 after Sergio Aguero’s departure and Guardiola accepted earlier in the campaign that it would take time for his players to learn to utilise the focal point Haaland’s presence provides.
However, the 22-year-old has been in excellent form since arriving at the Etihad Stadium and has 32 goals in 32 appearances for City across all competitions.
Given the striker’s insatiable desire to find the net, Guardiola was asked on Friday whether Haaland is frustrated after going two games without a goal.
He said: “In the game against Nottingham you are right. Arsenal no.
“Don’t make one game a big theory. He had chances in Nottingham in the first and second half.
“Of course we have to improve and we will improve. We have spoken about that many times and it is going to happen.
“Striker is the most difficult position in the world because they have two players focused on him and Erling has more. It’s not easy to do that.
“I would like to see in my career here our other strikers like Sergio [Aguero] or Gabriel [Jesus] when they player proper striker not false nine how many times did they touch the ball.
“It’s not about have the ball, striker, have the ball, striker. Our process is more.
“It’s fine. I am frustrated too. You are frustrated too in your life sometimes isn’t it? Happiness is overestimated.”
Bournemouth v City
City travel to Bournemouth for a 17:30 (UK) kick-off and you can follow the game across mancity.com and our official app.
We will start live updates at 15:30 on our Matchday Centre and that will run throughout the evening.
Our Matchday Live programme will begin shortly before team news arrives at 16:30. Natalie Pike will be in the studio with Steve McInerney, Paul Dickov and Dakota Ditcheva to give you a City-centric view on events down south.
During the game, Alistair Mann and Michael Brown will talk you through proceedings with our radio commentary offering.
Afterwards, we will bring you all the reaction before short highlights and extended highlights are available from midnight.
CITY+ subscribers can watch the entire 90 minutes back from midnight.
