It felt like Erling Haaland was never going to score against Arsenal, as he missed a procession of chances in Manchester City's huge win to take control of the title race.
Haaland would convert in the 94th minute to add gloss to a dominant City performance, breaking the record for goals scored in a 38-game Premier League season and leaving him one goal off the all-time record of 34 in a single season. His next goal will be his 50th for City, and he would usually be the headline story on a day where the title momentum swung firmly in the Blues' favour.
However this was a big game, and when the big games come around at the Etihad, Kevin De Bruyne usually steps up. With two goals and an assist, De Bruyne sent a message that he remains the best player in the squad.
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De Bruyne's brilliant run through the middle and laser-focussed finish was hardly a surprise, even if it was still a goal that few players in the world could score. His cross for John Stones' second and his cool finish to make it three were also actions to be expected of the Belgian. What was more notable, then, was the fact that Haaland was playing more of a provider role against Arsenal and ended with two assists on the night.
Haaland's control from Stones' long ball and smart lay-off for De Bruyne was as good a piece of build-up play he has produced all season, and his dropping deep was a key factor in City creating space against Arsenal. The Stones long ball, Haaland control and De Bruyne burst into space has now bamboozled Bayern Munich and Arsenal in the space of a week, while Haaland's all-round play was by far his best in any game so far for City.
Guardiola spoke of the more direct use of Haaland and De Bruyne after the game, noting that winning the second balls against Arsenal would be key. Arsenal analysts on Wednesday could be heard telling the bench to keep a better eye on De Bruyne, as he was losing his marker too often.
"When you can win it, we make contact with Kevin - the threat of Erling and Kevin is so important," he said. "But there was less time to play these type of balls. When we can find Kevin and he can run, because they make high pressing, he’s unstoppable. We know that.
"I didn’t teach how they [Haaland and De Bruyne] find each other in training. Footballers, more natural things can happen than you expect. All the time when Kevin has the ball, Erling knows he can run and give it. The opposite side as well. It happened many times. Kevin is a master of the assist with or without Erling. Erling scores goals all the time with or without Kevin. But being together, whe teams press so high and those balls with space behind, they are so dangerous and we use it.
"[Erling] cannot be in the box because Arsenal play so high. That’s why they are not in the box. When teams defend deep he will be in the box. The spaces are different. People say ‘how do you wanna play?’ How are you going to defend [against] me? We need to adjust something and we know from the two times we play against them that we struggled a lot in the FA Cup here and we struggled a lot in the Emirates.
"We tried to adjust something but the principles were the same. There are spaces in behind and I said you have to run. Kevin and Erling, this is the quality they have. If you have a false nine you cannot use it. We have Gabriel in the past, or Erling – both they have the pace to move in behind."
That gives a flavour of why Haaland was asked to come deep more against Arsenal, with De Bruyne going into more detail in an interview with NBC over how City used Haaland to drag Rob Holding and Gabriel out of position.
"The way that Arsenal press the opposition is top, it's class. It's really good and almost impossible to play from the back, especially a goal kick," De Bruyne explained.
"We know we had to play longer today. We tried a couple of things in training. I tried to get a little bit deep and run off Erling when he kept the ball. We found that a couple of times. In the first half we created chances that way.
"Normally we play with two number eights. He wanted a bit more control with the way they press. Gundo would be a bit more six and I had to choose more the moments depending on who presses out of Xhaka or Partey. If Partey was pressing I'd try to go on his back and around. It was difficult Holding and Gabriel, think 'do I need to go with Kevin? Are we staying with Erling?' I could find the moments in the first half. They switched in the second half. I was a bit more free today.
"Sometimes it was difficult because they were leaving Ruben free in open play. I was saying [to Haaland] that if I drop deep and Holding is coming with me, try to be on my back because Gabriel then needs to shift all the way across and that's hard. That's what we tried to exploit."
While Guardiola insists that he didn't teach the ever-improving link-up between De Bruyne and Haaland, those comments from the Belgian - referring to some in-game conversations about the Arsenal shape - suggests that it's a relationship that is starting to really flourish in recent weeks.
The pair have combined to assist the other for five goals in the last five matches when both have played, and are one De Bruyne assist for Haaland away from equalling the Premier League record of goals in a season set up by one player for another. Haaland has as many assists in his last five games as the 21 games before that.
If Haaland is starting to add assists and effective link-up play to his game - silencing a critique of him for the majority of the season - then it's a scary prospect to consider he could get even better. That would mean improving on a goal or assist every 58 minutes.
Guardiola was asked about Haaland's improvement in the build-up, saying: "We spoke many times with him. It’s fantastic to score as many as possible but you have to be involved in the game. You don’t like to touch balls, I like it - come and play and don’t lose your identity to score goals.
"But I don’t like when 10 players do the process and I am going to score the goals. Always you can be involved. The link is really good. He has the quality with the ball and after he can run. He’s doing really, really well."
It felt for a while that the best way to stopping Haaland scoring was to stop the balls from coming into the box. Some sides were more successful than others at doing that, but when De Bruyne is in his 'unstoppable' form and Haaland is now coming deep to effectively link play, then what hope do opposition teams have?
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