Pep Guardiola has promised Real Madrid they’ll see a different Erland Haaland in Wednesday’s Champions League semi-final second leg.

Haaland had a tough night at The Bernabeu with former Chelsea defender and German international Antonio Rudiger winning their duel. The 51-goal Norwegian striker had only 21 touches in Spain - the least of every starting player in Madrid including keepers Ederson and Thibout Courtois.

Ederson even outscored Haaland in passing stats with 19 to just 13 for the newly crowned Football Writers Footballer of the Year. Haaland, though, has made The Etihad his own personal playground scoring 35 of his 51 goals on home soil.

And with the return leg - evenly balanced at 1-1 after the first tie - Guardiola is hoping Haaland will flourish back on familiar territory and with a better supply from his team-mates.

"So congratulations to Rudiger. For Erling, we cannot forget, at 22 years old and it is the first time he has played in the semi-finals of the Champions League. We must consider that for the first time he went to the Bernabeu, one of the biggest stages where he faced Real Madrid which is a top class club with good defenders, good midfielders, and good strikers. So next time it will be a little bit easier. If the team is able to play a little bit better in some departments that we are thinking for Wednesday, maybe it will be easier for him."

“At the end it is what we are trying to do but he fought a lot and showed incredible commitment in what he had to do. I am pretty sure he is ready, first for Everton on Sunday and then the next games,” explained Pep. 

Kyle Walker- whether he plays or not in Sunday’s title crunch at Goodison Park. The England right back, 33 later this month, has been a key figure in City’s trophy-winning success but he has only played in 32 of the club’s 54 games this season. And that has left Guardiola saluting the attitude of his speedy defender after benching him for both legs of the quarter-final against Bayern Munich.

Pep added, "Why should he not be ready? It does not matter if he plays or not. They are here, getting taken care of really well and when the team needs them, they will be ready. Kyle has been that. He knows part of the season the reason why he didn’t play, we spoke together many times and he knows the reason why, which is just tactical decisions, no more than that. He is a really important player for us but sometimes we need that type of player in that position and sometimes we need him specifically, that is the only reason why."