Antoine Semenyo seemed unexpectedly energetic as he exited Tottenham’s away dressing room last Sunday. Manchester City had just finished a debrief there, emphasizing that a hefty 42 points were still available in the current title race.

After squandering a two-goal advantage in a chaotic match that nearly relieved Thomas Frank of his duties two weeks prior, the options for what could be said seemed limited. Nonetheless, Semenyo exuded a genuine belief that Arsenal, who stood six points ahead, could be overtaken.

A significant reason for this optimism likely stems from the expectation that City’s scoring woes may soon resolve. Despite his upbeat demeanor, Semenyo acknowledged that City should have secured the game by halftime, avoiding their recurring second-half struggles. “I had a chance, and obviously, others had chances as well,” he noted.

City concluded a thoroughly dominated first half with a two-goal lead, which proved insufficient to secure victory. Some might attribute this to poor game management or defensive issues, but Pep Guardiola has been increasingly frustrated by his team’s lack of finishing touch, as evidenced by just one win in their last six Premier League matches.

“Too many clear chances,” Guardiola remarked. “Easy to score. We’ve faced incredible defensive challenges due to a lack of players, but our real issue is upfront. We miss opportunities that should be goals, and with those, we’d be in a stronger Premier League position.”

Pep Guardiola has been going mad at Manchester City’s lack of ruthlessness during a run in the Premier League of one victory from their last six games

Erling Haaland has one goal from open play in his last 12 appearances and is just not as clinical at the moment as we are used to

Upon reviewing extended highlights of their recent six matches—draws against Sunderland, Chelsea, Brighton, and Tottenham, a loss to Manchester United, and a win over Wolves—the tally of “decent” missed chances stands at 28. Astonishingly, the chance Semenyo mentioned at Spurs didn’t even make the list.

These range from incidents like at the Stadium of Light on New Year’s Day when Rayan Cherki and Savinho were exchanging crosses to nobody with Sunderland all at sea, to Phil Foden cutting inside two Chelsea defenders 15 yards out and skewing wide.

From Bernardo Silva picking up a loose Yasin Ayari pass inside Brighton’s box and shooting wide rather than squaring for an incredulous Haaland to Max Alleyne’s header at Old Trafford being scrambled off the line.

From Omar Marmoush somehow hitting the far post six yards out after the ball had brushed Yerson Mosquera’s hand in that contentious non-penalty incident to Tijjani Reijnders meeting a Silva cross at Tottenham with his nose instead of head.

Josko Gvardiol not sorting his feet out in front of goal or Marc Guehi effectively standing on the ball as he bore down.

The list goes on, they’re all on it. Six clips for Haaland, five for Cherki. Savinho’s on three from his only appearance of the set. Silva and Reijnders also come in with three apiece.

The six scored in this spell is around three goals shy of their expected number, which is not an exact science but offers a fair prediction of attacking success. Making up that three, spread across separate draws, equates to six points – the gap with Arsenal.

Again, not an exact science yet it does suggest how fine the margins might be. Three chances of those 28 – and so still missing 25 of them – and things look significantly rosier in City’s garden.

Tijjani Reijnders missed an easy chance from 14 yards against Newcastle – but did eventually get on the scoresheet

Savinho has managed to miss three good chances in one appearance in City’s poor run

Guardiola will be buoyed by the three they managed in beating Newcastle United on Wednesday to reach the Carabao Cup final. Marmoush with a couple, Reijnders sweeping in a third. Aside from that, Aaron Ramsdale made a stunning save to deny Haaland – but the big man in full flight would undoubtedly bury it. And Reijnders somehow sidefooted wide from 14 yards.

‘Sometimes it’s unlucky, sometimes maybe it’s the sharpness,’ Reijnders said pointedly. ‘You saw how many spaces we got against Newcastle. We really had some big chances as well and we didn’t even score all of them.’

This comes down to positional play too, not just the finishing. On Wednesday night, Rayan Ait-Nouri buccaneered down the left, Malick Thiaw coming across to block a shot, but could the Algerian have completed an easy cutback instead? The answer is yes and City would have walked it in.

Guardiola is still waiting for some of this new-look City to perfect the art of precision decision-making, a facet of their game that was so reliable for so many years with the usual suspects that the genius of it became lost.

‘We arrive to the edge (of the box), ones against ones, ones against ones many times and we don’t even shoot – and in that we need to improve,’ Guardiola said this week. 

Marmoush’s introduction helps, with the Egyptian often letting fly from anywhere, and the use of a box midfield with two strikers might give him more game time.

There has also been some occasional irritation from the manager at playing too safe. Guardiola screamed at Silva down at Spurs for going backwards in midfield rather than progressing the move. In his ninth season with the Catalan, Silva knows the drill: he winced in recognition of his error.

Not a name you’d associate with safe, Cherki has had a couple of these verbal volleys in the past few days. Ait-Nouri was primed for a quick break on Sunday but the Frenchman went backwards, leaving Guardiola exasperated.

Omar Marmoush’s introduction helps, with the Egyptian often letting fly from anywhere, and the use of a box midfield with two strikers might give him more game time

Even Rayan Cherki is coming under fire from Guardiola after going back when he should have gone forwards

Similar happened against Newcastle, Cherki completing a neat pass back towards his defence rather than playing on the turn. Words from the technical area were aimed in his direction.

But those moments aren’t quite as important as the 28. Shave the numbers slightly and City’s outlook is certainly different.

It’s not often you can say a Guardiola team isn’t scoring enough – particularly when no team in the league has found the net more than them this year. Yet here we are.