At just 20-years-old, Borussia Dortmund Erling Haaland is the Next Greatest Football Player After Messi and Ronaldo. PSG’s Neymar and Kylian Mbappe are good, but Haaland is an ever-hungry goal-scoring machine.

The young Norwegian forward has been consistent in the Bundesliga and the UEFA Champions league matches 2020/21.

In the 2020/21 season, Haaland had 49 goals in 49 games across all competitions, as of March.

It’s unfortunate that Manchester United missed out on the Haaland transfer deal. He could have provided an amicable solution to Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s inconsistent strikers.

Like the air, ERLING HAALAND is  EVERYWHERy at the same time. According to ESPN, each time Norway played the ball upfield against Honduras at last year’s U20 World Cup, Haaland floated away from the defense effortlessly.  The ball would land at his feet as if it were destined to be there. 

Erling Haaland is the Next best Football Player After Messi and Ronaldo

Why Erling Haaland is the Next Greatest Football Player After Messi and Ronaldo

At 20 years old, Borussia Dortmund striker Erling Haaland already has 14 Champions League goals in 11 games. It took Lionel Messi 28 games to net that amount.

That’s the thing about Haaland. No matter how many goals he scores, he always wants one more. That was true when he was growing up in the small town of Bryne.

he broke records at Red Bull Salzburg in Austria and now as he’s become the brightest young thing at Germany’s Borussia Dortmund, a club known for incubating Europe’s bright young things.

If there’s any doubt that he is one of the most exciting young players on the planet, consider this: He has scored 14 Champions League goals in 11 games, as of Nov. 4. 

It took Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo 28 and 51 games, respectively, to do the same. His rise to stardom has been dizzying, even bewildering. But Haaland has been prepping for this his whole life, and so far, the plan is working.

Growing up in Norway, Haaland, front left, trained with kids a year older than he was under the watchful eye.

Haaland is often compared with legendary Swedish striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic because of their shared Scandinavian background and thirst for goals.

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Mino-Raiola, Erling-Haaland’s agent

 And Haaland can seem Zlatan-esque in his humor: He once told reporters that he sleeps with his hat trick balls and that his alarm is the Champions League anthem. 

Those who know him say he’s different privately, easy to talk to and be around. He seems popular among his teammates, quick to joke or break into song. 

His childhood coach, Alf Ingve Berntsen, puts it down to a cultural difference: “In this part of Norway, we do not talk so much. The ethic is to work hard. It’s more important what you do than what you say.”

Haaland takes his physical fitness and recovery very seriously. On top of team practices, he works out with a fitness coach at home via FaceTime.

Erling Haaland’s father ensures that Erling Haaland is the Next Greatest Football Player After Messi and Ronaldo.

Alfie Haaland, Erling’s father, draws on his own experience to help his son make shrewd career decisions. He played for Nottingham Forest, Leeds and Manchester City before an infamous tackle in 2001 from Manchester United’s Roy Keane led him to retire at age 30.

Haaland’s coach, Berntsen, put the young boy in with kids a year older, which challenged Haaland to be smart about his movement and to outmaneuver opponents instead of trying to outmuscle them.

When Haaland did get outmuscled, Berntsen reassured him, telling the boy to be patient, that his growth spurt would come.

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What Abilities Make Erling Haaland Special and the Best Upcoming Player in the World?

As impressive as Haaland’s physical attributes are — he’s listed at 6-foot-4 and 192 pounds — his mental strength stands taller. “He’ll think, ‘Why should I not score three goals in my first game?’ 

Then he scores three goals,” Ostigard says. “Not so many players think that.”

Berntsen believes that what makes Haaland special is neither his physique nor his technique. 

“Many players who have all these qualities are very afraid: ‘What if I don’t make it? What if I don’t succeed?’ Erling doesn’t think like that. He is fearless.”

Erling Haaland enjoys the pressure of playing for Borussia Dortmund.

Dortmund Forward Erling Haaland

Ole Gunnar Solskjær and Erling Haaland at Molde

Haaland broke through at Molde under Ole Gunnar Solskjær, now the manager of Manchester United, and in July 2018 scored four goals in 17 minutes to help his team beat the league leaders, Brann, 4-0. As Haaland predicted, after two years, it was time to pack his bags.

But when Italian giants Juventus came calling, Haaland did what few teenagers in his shoes would do. He said no. Erling Haaland is the Next Greatest Football Player After Messi and Ronaldo, he makes smarter decisions.

Clubs like Juventus, Barcelona and Chelsea boast promising youth players by the busload, the prospect of playing for Europe’s greatest teams too tempting a proposition for talented kids and their parents to turn down.

A move to Juventus was mouthwatering, but Haaland and his advisers were savvy enough to realize it was too soon. As good as he was, he wasn’t going to knock Ronaldo out of the team.

He understood that at his age, the status of the club was less significant than his status in it. The most important thing was to play, and if he kept playing well, Juventus, Real Madrid and others would come back for him.

“Erling and his family have been very clever to pick the right choices,” Berntsen says.

Instead, he chose Red Bull Salzburg, a big team in the small Austrian league that would give him time to develop but also would expose him to the Champions League.

“I thought it was too early to go there [Juventus],” he said at the time. “It was very important to look at how important a part I was going to play for the club I joined. There is more of a chance of playing here.”

That decision has since proved to be prudent, even brilliant.

Playing for Salzburg and Borussia Dortmund: Erling Haaland is the Next Greatest Football Player After Messi and Ronaldo

• The then-19-year-old went on to score a hat trick, announcing his entrée into the top echelons of European football in the loudest way possible and sending the phones ringing at the Salzburg offices. 
• Clubs from all over Europe started asking after him, and Haaland kept scoring, as if daring them to come and get him with each strike. Eight goals in five consecutive games in the Champions League, a record for a teenager.
• After completing a move from Salzburg, Haaland scored three goals on his first three shots in the Bundesliga to help Borussia Dortmund come back against Augsburg in January.
• With such sustained success, it’s unsurprising that Haaland is being linked with moves away from Dortmund to the likes of Real Madrid and Liverpool. 
• He already has played more games for Dortmund than he did for Salzburg, and it seems like only a matter of time before he’s ready to level up again. It could be as soon as next season.
• Haaland reportedly has a €75 million ($88 million) transfer release clause in his contract that activates in 2022, two years before his deal expires in June 2024. 
• “[Haaland and his team] were always aware that the player has to progress, and that’s how he’s chosen his clubs,” Fjortoft says. “Most of it is from his dad, but there are a lot of former footballers who are not good at seeing that.”
• According to Haaland, he doesn’t see Ronaldo, Messi, or any other player as his role model. “I want to have my own career, my own Erling Haaland career.”, he said.

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