Interesting stories about the Norwegian ‘scorer’ – Erling Haaland!
Erling Haaland is a striker who plays for Norway and Manchester City. Haaland was born on July 21, 2000 in Leeds, England. At that time, his father – Mr. Alf-Inge Haaland was playing for Leeds United club. Erling Haaland grew up in Bryne, Norway and got acquainted with football quite early.
In 2017, Haaland signed a professional contract with Molde FK club and made his debut in the Norwegian league. He made a strong impression when he scored 4 goals in his first game. The rich Austrian team – Red Bull Salzburg quickly recruited this striker and helped him become famous in Europe.
In December 2019, Haaland refused to go to RB Leipzig (the club with the same system as Salzburg) to join Borussia Dortmund.
With a hat-trick against FC Augsburg on his debut, he quickly became the star of Signal Iduna Park. Performance in the 2020-21 season puts Haaland in the same category as the best strikers in the world. He scored 27 goals in 28 Bundesliga appearances.
The Norwegian striker scored 10 goals in the UEFA Champions League that season, sharing the top scorer position with Paris Saint-Germain’s Kylian Mbappe. The excellent form in the German team helped Haaland take another step forward in his career: Joining Manchester City in the summer of 2022. This is also the team where his father played before he had to retire due to injury.
Haaland’s style of play is an interesting blend of traditional and modern target strikers. The striker’s tall physique, power and speed are the nightmare of the defenders assigned to him. Haaland can finish well with both feet and head and concede many times from seemingly harmless situations.
The nickname ‘Score Machine’ given to Erling Haaland is absolutely correct. Although he has not won major titles, what the Norwegian striker has shown has proven that he is one of the best strikers the football world has ever seen.
With talent and seriousness in training, Haaland will surely become a top star of world football in the near future.
Here are 15 interesting facts about Erling Haaland that you probably didn’t know…
Sports family! 🏃
Haaland was born into a family of ‘sports blood’. His parents are both famous athletes. His father is Alf-Inge Haaland player, who played for Leeds United and Manchester City.
Alf-Inge’s top-flight career didn’t last as long as he wanted, because of Roy Keane’s knock-out tackle in the 2001 Manchester derby.
His mother, Gry Marita Braun, was a Norwegian triathlon champion in the 90s. In Tron, Erling Haaland’s grandfather was a famous cross-country runner.
Tall body, full strength, mature competition… It’s not surprising for a guy born in such a family!
Was persuaded into the handball career 🤾
Erling is following in his father’s footsteps as a professional soccer player. However, few people know that Mr. Alf-Inge gave his son many sports experiences before deciding on a career. At the age of 14, Erling practiced handball, track and field, and skiing.
As a person with natural ‘sports blood’, Haaland quickly got used to the sports and shined. He is considered by handball coaches as an excellent athlete and will soon become famous. Mr. Alf-Inge revealed that the Norwegian handball coach once met with his family to convince Erling to follow this sport.
And as we all know, Norway’s handball team has lost a talent!
Set a world record at the age of… 5 years old
Many people don’t know that Erling Haaland had his first world record when he was just… 5 years old
5 years old – the age when most kids are still playing games or watching cartoons, Haaland is already practicing sports. His family set a goal for him to become an outstanding athlete.
On January 22, 2006, Erling Haaland had a 1m63 high jump !
It’s a world record that hasn’t been broken for 17 years.
Haaland’s opponents should know this to be less shocked when they see him head high or volley.
Eligible to play for England
Haaland is the pride and future of Norwegian football.
He has scored 21 goals in 23 appearances for the national team. But a little swallow doesn’t make spring! Unfortunately, Norway was unable to win tickets to the 2022 World Cup.
Things could have been different had Haaland chosen to play for England. This striker was born in Leeds, so he is eligible to play for the Three Lions. However, Erling Haaland still chose to follow in his father’s footsteps, playing for Man City and the Norwegian national team. This is an understandable decision of the ‘goal machine’ as he spent all his youth years in this Nordic country.
And so the fearsome striker Haaland – Kane will never be together in England. The funniest people in this story are probably the defenders.
Zlatan idol
Haaland is a fan of both Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi. However, the name he mentioned the most was Zlatan Ibrahimovic.
The karate kick against Dortmund (September 2022) shows that the Norwegian striker has learned a lot from Ibra.
The Swedish player has had an illustrious career. At the age of 40, he still causes many difficulties for defenders in Serie A. With what he is showing, Haaland is likely to break records like Ibra. He may even go further than his idol with the Golden Ball title.
However, Haaland certainly cannot match Zlatan Ibrahimovic in terms of “shaping” both on the field and in the newspaper.
Nickname ‘Big Baby’
Although she has not yet eaten her 23rd birthday, Haaland has a tall, muscular body. His current height is 1m94.
Since playing in Norway, this striker has had such an impressive figure. Therefore, he was nicknamed ‘Big Baby’ by his Molde teammates.
Debuted at the age of 15 with a series of matches… no match!
Haaland is not always ‘lucky’ to score as it is now.
The striker started his career at the Academy of Bryne club (Norway) at the age of only 5 years old. A decade later, he made his first team debut at the age of 15. In that match, Haaland played the full 90 minutes. His team lost to KFUM-Kameratene Oslo in a stadium with just over 1600 spectators.
Haaland was very aggressive and had some chances. Outstanding physicality and quick reflexes help him always be present in dangerous positions in the penalty area. Unfortunately, this young striker did not score.
Not only that, Haaland also “did” in all of the first 16 matches for Bryne FK in the Second Division. But Molde is not looking at goalscoring record, but rather the youngster’s influence in games. And so Norway’s biggest club recruited Haaland.
At that time, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was the coach of Molde.
Score NINE goals in one game
Playing & scoring has become Haaland’s habit since he joined RB Salzburg.
Still know Haaland is a scary goalscorer but he has scored… 9 GOALs in just one game!
Yes, you didn’t read it wrong. This unlucky team is U20 Honduras in the U20 World Cup. Haaland has conceded 9 times, equivalent to 3 hat-tricks in just one game.
Norway U20 was eliminated right after the group stage. However, Haaland still won the Golden Shoe award.
Let Champions League music be your alarm! ⏰
Playing in the Champions League is every player’s dream. As a child, Haaland used to lose sleep and eat to watch this tournament. He also used the official Champions League song as his alarm ringtone.
In an interview with TV2, while playing for Salzburg, the striker shared: “It’s my alarm clock. I wake up to that song every day so there’s always the perfect start to the day. I listen to it. I can listen to it over and over again without getting bored.”
The cameras captured the moment Haaland hummed along to this song, before the confrontation between Manchester City and Borussia Dortmund at the Etihad (April 2021). The Norwegian striker is eager to help The Citizens end the “curse” in the Champions League, thereby realizing the dream of touching the prestigious silver trophy.
Copy CR7’s diet
Most athletes are very interested in refueling to stay in shape. Haaland is no exception.
But instead of listening to nutritionists, he followed the somewhat strict diet of his idol Cristiano Ronaldo.
We all know Ronaldo is one of the players with the most disciplined diet and training. Thanks to that, the Portuguese superstar still shines in the top tournaments, while many of his teammates have retired even though they have just turned 30.
In 2020, Haaland’s father revealed that his son ate the same dishes as Ronaldo, including fish, chicken, noodles and no salt or sauce added.
The secret of the rush phase! ⚡
At 1m94 tall and weighing 87kg, Haaland has a rather large body.
However, this striker has very fast speed. Strong pillar kicks, long strides combined with muscular strength make Haaland superior in speed races with opponents.
In the match against PSG in 2020, he used to run at a speed of 36km/h. That is the speed an athlete needs to reach to qualify for the 2018 World Athletics Championships.
First teenage player to score in 5 consecutive Champions League games
Haaland has had a dream start in the Champions League arena. He scored 20 goals in just 14 matches; Become the youngest player and reach this goal milestone the fastest.
In addition, there is a record that will probably only be held by Haaland in perpetuity!
In the match against Genk, Haaland came on and scored for RB Salzburg. It was the 5th game in a row in the Champions League that the striker conceded a goal!
That goal made him the first teen player to achieve this feat. Del Piero, Neymar, Cristiano Ronaldo and Robert Lewandowski also scored in five consecutive Champions League matches. But then, they were the superstars of world football.
Score 5 goals in less than 1 hour
Haaland became the third player in history, after Lionel Messi and Luiz Adriano, to score five goals in a single UEFA Champions League match. In that match, Manchester City defeated RB Leipzig with a score of 7-0.
Worth mentioning, Haaland only took 57 minutes to score 5 goals. Meanwhile, Messi took 84 minutes and Adriano took 82 minutes to achieve this record.
The youngest and fastest player to reach 30 goals in the Champions League
Also in the aforementioned match, Haaland reached the milestone of 30 goals in the Champions League, after 25 matches. He became the youngest and fastest player to reach this milestone in the history of the tournament.
Ruud van Nistelrooy and Lionel Messi held this record before being replaced by Haaland.
Going to bed with… shadow 😂
While playing for Salzburg, Haaland revealed that he liked the feeling of scoring so much that he took the ball to bed, caressed and slept with him.
In a recent interview with Premier League Productions, the Norwegian striker confirmed this once again:
“It’s true. I like to score hat-tricks so I want to feel more of the ball.”
Haaland’s girlfriend definitely doesn’t like this!
