Haaland finally scores again: Five Talking Points from the afternoon's Premier League action

Five Talking Points from the afternoon's Premier League action.

It was the second-last day of Premier League action in 2024 and most of the sides were playing.

With runaway league leaders Liverpool playing in the evening, here are the talking points from the afternoon's fixtures.

1. Nottingham Forest are second!

There's not much to add beyond the headline here but it really does need to be said multiple times very loudly that Nottingham Forest are second in the Premier League!

They were fourth to begin the day, which in itself is an incredible achievement. But their 0-2 win away to Everton has seen them leapfrog Arsenal and Chelsea (who play tomorrow) up into second.

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A goal and an assist from striker Chris Wood made it six straight wins for Nuno Espirito Santo's men since they lost to Man City, during which time they have beaten both Man Utd and Tottenham.

With just one league matches before they face Liverpool, there's a genuine chance that their clash on January 14 could be a battle of first against second in a throwback to the late 1970's!

2. Pep celebrates with Savinho on the left

Pep Guardiola became the second manager to lead the club to 500 games today as he led his men out against Leicester City.

And to Man City's credit, they picked up a much needed victory. The 0-2 win was their first victory (and clean sheet) since they beat Forest 3-0 at the start of the month and their first away win since October.

The star of the day was his Brazilian winger Savinho, who was deployed on the left rather than the right.

This switch proved to be key as Savinho's goal and assist both came from that flank.

His goal showed the value of a left-footer out there as his ability to smash the rebound in first-time would not have been so easy for a right-footer. And his assist was also a quick decisive action that a right-footer would have been able to take.

Has Pep discovered a tactical tweak to get his team back in business?

3. Erling Haaland back among the goals

Tactical tweaks mean little without goals, of course, and Man City got their second through Erling Haaland who powered Savinho's cross home.

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It was Haaland's 14th league goal of the season, which doesn't seem too remarkable, but when you realise he scored his 12th league goal of the season at the start of November you start to realise how big this is.

For those of you doing the maths, yes, that means that in close to two months Erling Haaland has scored just one goal in the Premier League (away to Crystal Palace) a bafflingly barren spell for the titanic striker.

City will be praying that this strike can get their goal machine going, because their squad is otherwise quite lacking in terms of scoring.

4. Spurs just can't help themselves

After two horrible defeats in a row, Spurs were hoping that a home game against Wolves would allow them to get their mojo back.

And after they turned around an early deficit to lead 2-1 at half-time, they must have felt confident of getting the win and re-finding their mojo.

But Spurs gonna Spurs. They didn't score a third goal, allowing Wolves to stay in the game and, sure enough, in the 87th minute Jorgen Strand-Larsen popped up with a goal to draw things level.

The result keeps Spurs in the bottom half of the table heading into 2025, and if results go against them they could be as low as 14th.

5. Saints look doomed

Under Russell Martin, Southampton looked a bold, progressive side that was simply lacking in enough quality to play that style of football.

It looked like they got promoted a year too soon, and that a relegation and instant re-promotion could be what they need to assemble a better squad more capable of playing the Premier League.

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Well they're certainly going to get that relegation at the very least, losing 2-1 away to Crystal Palace despite taking the lead through their prodigy Tyler Dibling.

Saints have now lost six of their last eight in the league and with just 6 points to their name are surely doomed, although having sacked Russell Martin they no longer play with that same bold, progressive style.

So they're just going to go down.