The wait is finally over for Manchester City fans as the club have now confirmed the signing of striker Erling Braut Haaland from Borussia Dortmund on a five-year contract.
The 21-year-old will follow in the footsteps of his father Alf-Inge Haaland, who played for the Citizens between 2000 and 2003, and he will officially link up with his new teammates on July 1.
There is plenty of excitement surrounding the arrival of Haaland, who has been one of Europe's deadliest marksmen since bursting onto the scene in his native Norway.
Haaland will now test himself under Pep Guardiola with the reigning Premier League champions and ahead of his first season at the Etihad Stadium, Sports Mole takes an in-depth look at his goal-laden career so far.
Beginnings in his native Norway
— Erling Haaland (@ErlingHaaland) February 1, 2017
Born in Leeds in July 2000, just a month after his father swapped Elland Road for Man City, the Haaland family decided to move back to Norway and settle in the southwestern town of Bryne when Erling was three years old.
Haaland engaged in a plethora of different sports as a child, including football, golf, handball, cross-country skiing and track and field. In 2006 at the age of just five, he broke a world record in his age group – which he still holds – for the standing long jump, achieving a distance of 1.63m.
In the same year, Haaland joined local football club Bryne, where he gradually progressed through the youth ranks before making his professional debut in the Norwegian second tier as a 15-year-old. His performances attracted interest from a host of European clubs but it was Norwegian giants Molde, managed by Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, who recruited the talented striker in February 2017.
Initially, Haaland was integrated slowly into the first-team fold, but in 2018 he announced himself as one of the most promising strikers in Europe. He finished the season as the club's top scorer with 12 goals in 25 league appearances – including 10 strikes in his final 13 games – to help Molde finish second in the Eliteserien.
Haaland began the following season with Molde before joining Austrian champions Red Bull Salzburg on a permanent deal in January 2019.
Elevating his game with Red Bull Salzburg
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Haaland made only five appearances for Red Bull Salzburg in the second half of the 2018-19 season, but a prolific start to the following campaign saw the teenage sensation make his mark on the European stage.
Within the first nine weeks of the season, between July and mid-September, Haaland scored 17 goals in just nine appearances across all competitions, including four hat-tricks.
The 19-year-old netted a treble on his Champions League debut against Genk in a 6-2 home victory, while he also scored three times in Austrian top-flight games against Wolfsberger and TSV Hartberg.
Haaland went on to score a remarkable 29 goals in just 27 appearances for Jesse Marsch's Salzburg side across all tournaments, including eight strikes in six Champions League group-stage matches.
Understandably, the striker's form did not go unnoticed and he made the switch to German giants Borussia Dortmund in January 2020 for a fee in the region of £17m. Salzburg finished the campaign without Haaland but still went on to win the Austrian Bundesliga title and Austrian Cup double.
Goals galore at Borussia Dortmund
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Some players when joining a new club need a period of time to settle in before reaping the rewards. However, Haaland took to the German Bundesliga like a duck to water and continued his impressive goalscoring form with Dortmund.
The Norwegian came off the bench to score a 23-minute hat-trick on his debut in a 5-3 victory against Augsburg, before scoring seven more goals in his next five league matches. Haaland finished the 2019-20 campaign with 44 goals and 10 assists in 40 appearances for both Salzburg and Dortmund across all competitions, including 16 strikes in 18 games for the latter.
In the following campaign, 20-year-old Haaland showed no signs of slowing down and he scored 11 goals in his opening eight games for BVB, including four in a 5-2 Bundesliga victory away at Hertha Berlin. In a 4-2 league defeat to rivals Bayern Munich in March 2021, Haaland scored his 99th and 100th senior career goals, reaching the milestone after only 146 appearances.
Haaland continued his goalscoring feats in the Champions League, and a second-leg brace in the last 16 against Sevilla saw him become the youngest player to reach 20 goals in the competition, impressively doing so after only 14 matches.
Haaland ended the season on a high by scoring a brace to help Dortmund win 4-1 against RB Leipzig in the DFB-Pokal final. The Norwegian finished with 41 goals in as many matches, and not only was he named Bundesliga Player of the Season but he also finished the campaign as the top-scoring player in the Champions League with 10 strikes in eight games.
In the 2021-22 season, Haaland struggled with injuries and was reduced to 30 appearances across all competitions. However, he was still able to rack up 29 goals, including 22 in 24 Bundesliga matches.
Haaland became the youngest and quickest Bundesliga player to reach 50 goals with a strike in the 3-1 win over Wolfsburg in November. The Norwegian's final game for Dortmund saw him convert from the penalty spot in a 2-1 win over Hertha Berlin, taking his overall tally with the club to 86 goals in 89 appearances.
International career
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Haaland has represented Norway at all age groups from the Under-15s right the way up to the senior side. At youth level, the striker scored 30 goals in 46 appearances, although nearly a third of those were remarkably in one game.
As an 18-year-old at the 2019 Under-20s World Cup, he scored nine goals in a 12-0 victory for Norway over Honduras. Despite this result, Norway were eliminated in the group stage but Haaland still claimed the Golden Boot award.
Haaland received his first senior call-up in August 2019, eight months after joining Dortmund, and he made his debut the following month as a 19-year-old in a Euro 2020 qualifier, with Norway beating Malta 2-0 in Oslo.
The striker had to wait 12 months before scoring his first senior international goal in a 2-1 UEFA Nations League defeat against Austria. The following month saw Haaland net his first international hat-trick in a 4-0 win over Romania, and he finished the 2020-21 tournament as the joint-top scorer with six strikes, along with Belgium's Romelu Lukaku and Spain's Ferran Torres.
Haaland has now found the net 20 times in 21 appearances for Norway, including five strikes in four Nations League appearances during this month's international break.
Oliver Thomas
