ERLING STRONG
P
rior to the summer of 2019, hardly
anyone outside of Norway had heard
of Erling Braut Haaland, although he
was coming off one full season in the
Austrian Bundesliga.
He did make some ripples during the
Under-20 World Cup, when he scored a
whopping nine goals against a hapless
Honduras side as Norway cruised to a 12-0
victory. It was not enough to prevent his
team from crashing out in the group stage,
but it was enough to get people talking
because it looked more like something akin
to a video game than a real-life match.
Predictably it set numerous records: the
most scored by a single player, the most
goals scored in a game, the biggest win
ever for Norway, and the worst defeat
suffered for Honduras. Moreover, Haaland
earned the Golden Boot despite not netting
a single additional goal for the rest of the
tournament.
After that, there were some who forgot
about him. After all, the summer of 2019
was full of numerous tournaments featuring
a number of exploits by stars from all over
the world, and theUnnder-20 World Cup
was just one of them. But not everyone
forgot. Honduras are not exactly the
toughest opponents, but scoring nine goals
in one game is not something that happens
every day – even it is at the youth level. So
there were clubs who started tracking hisWHY DID BORUSSIA DORTMUND WANT ERLING BRAUT HAALAND, AND WHY DID HAALAND WANT DORTMUND? MICHELLE OSEI BONSU LOOKS AT
EUROPE’S HOTTEST YOUNG PROPERTY...PIATEK
WARNING
Erling Braut Haaland needs only
look at another player moving to the
Bundesliga to see how quickly fortunes
change. But, Michelle Osei Bonsu notes,
it can still work out.Young players do come and go. Erling
Braut Haaland is on a hot-streak, but
over in Serie A, there was another player
who not too long ago was also scoring
goals left and right at a blistering rate,
only to tail off spectacularly.
Remember Krzysztof Piątek? He burst
onto the scene with Genoa and at one
point was leading the scoring charts in
Serie A, leading a desperate Milan to
snap him up halfway through his debut
term with the Grifone. Unfortunately
for the Polish talent, although he had
a solid second half of his first season
in Serie A, his first full season at the
San Siro turned out to be an utter
disappointment, with just five goals in
20 appearances across all competitions
and the Rossoneri decided to bring in
veteran striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic. Now,
he’s joined Hertha Berlin in a bid to get
his career back.
Haaland is four years younger than
Piatek, but it does go to show that
young players can easily blow hot and
cold just at the drop of a hat. Dortmund
obviously won’t be putting all their
eggs in one basket, as they have the
reliable Jadon Sancho in their ranks
who already has the experience of
playing in the Bundesliga under his belt,
and die Schwarzgelben have shown
that they are not afraid to jettison a
player who doesn’t seem to be meeting
expectations – as is in the case of Paco
Alcacer when his performances took
a downturn in the earlier half of this
season.
Still, Haaland is much younger than the
Spaniard, and Dortmund are a club who
are willing to invest in young players – if
the player himself is willing to commit
to the club. They have stuck with Marco
Reus through all his injury troubles
when many clubs would have simply
given up and cut the player loose.
For all intents and purposes, on
paper, Haaland does look like a player
who could be an excellent long-term
investment. Even if he does decide to
move on, Dortmund could sell him for a
significant profit when the time is right- similar to what they did with Pierre-
Emerick Aubameyang and Arsenal.
progress as the young Norwegian headed
back to resume preparations with Red Bull
Salzburg for his sophomore season, and he
quickly proved that his exploits from the
summer were not just a mere flash in the
pan.
In just half a season, he racked up 20 goals
in 16 league and cup appearances but what
really got people talking was his showings
in the Champions League. Red Bull Salzburg
were the underdogs in a tricky quartet with
reigning champions Liverpool and Napoli,
under the tutelage of legendary manager
Carlo Ancelotti. To top it off, Haaland was
featuring in his first ever tournament at this
level.
Stage fright proved not to be something
the debutant suffered from, as he racked
up an impressive eight goals in Salzburg’s
group stage campaign. Those goals
included becoming only the second
teenager after Real Madrid’s Karim
Benzema to score in all of his first three
appearances in the competition [by finding
the back of the net against both Liverpool
and Napoli, no less], and later became
the first teenager to score in four straight
games when he did a double against the
Partenopei.
He wrapped up this phenomenal scoring
run by netting in five consecutive games
to put himself in some esteemed company,
joining the likes of Neymar, Cristiano
Ronaldo and Robert Lewandowski as wellBELOW LEFT:
It was his nine goals
in a single game for
Norway’s Under-20s
that put Erling Braut
Haaland on the map
BELOW RIGHT:
Goals in the
Champions League
only enhanced
Haaland’s burgeoning
reputationFEATURE