Haaland is a goal machine

Haaland is a rare case at City where few people doubt the choice of the club. The transfer is so powerful that even competitors react. Jurgen Klopp: Haaland will make City stronger This is a good player. City have never been and never will be a team that wins thanks to one player. They have a particular style of play. I think Erling will suddenly realize that he will score a lot of goals with his foot at the far post. He will love it. He’s a real beast. “Such a detailed and enthusiastic reaction to someone else’s deal is a rare case at the top level. Haaland has been one of the most notable players in the world for at least two and a half years. Who has he surpassed? Who will be surpassed here? Who is he unlikely to reach?

In terms of conversion (goals per minute), Haaland is second only to one player

Holland has been around for a long time, but he entered a truly competitive environment in the winter of 2020, when he moved from RB Salzburg to Borussia. Soon the pandemic began, and the year turned out to be crumpled. For the sake of experimentation, let’s look at Haaland’s goal stats over two full seasons in the Bundesliga and compare him to the competition. The Norwegian played 4229 minutes in the championship and scored 48 goals. For a premium level, is it small, average or prohibitive? The answer is on the chart. In terms of goals, Haaland is in the top five, only Lewandowski, Mbappe and Benzema are ahead, but! The Norwegian played almost 1000 minutes less than the main group of competitors. Hence the highest conversion: an average of 88 minutes per goal. For comparison: Mbappe scores every 102 minutes, Benzema every 109 minutes. Only one person in the world can look down on Holland’s performance. The chart once again captures the greatness of Robert Lewandowski. There are still no equal strikers in top football. 75 goals in two seasons, averaging 71 minutes per goal. The Pole’s 13 goals from the penalty spot did not greatly affect the alignment, because his competitors also shoot from the point (Haaland has 7 goals), but it is still correct to separately evaluate the goals from the game.

Without taking into account penalties, the advantage over the rest is even greater. But far from Lewandowski

He scores a little more than expected (at a distance of xG and real goals converge correctly), he is far behind Lewandowski, but at the same time he surpasses top competitors like Mbappe, Salah, Ronaldo and Benzema. Key detail: Haaland is significantly younger than the most notable players on this chart. It is clear that even if the Norwegian has almost no equal in the world, then at his age he also dominates. 

Only Mbappe started so briskly. Cristiano and Messi behind

To understand the anomaly of Haaland’s pace, let’s look at how other stars started: Ronaldo, Messi, Benzema, Mbappe and Lewandowski. Haaland moves faster than the young Messi and Ronaldo, not to mention Benzema and Lewandowski, who matured later. At the same time, even after the end of the era of Messi and Ronaldo, Haaland will not be able to rule undividedly – Mbappe is going at about the same pace and so far is clearly not slowing down. But Holland is also clearly not satisfied with his performance. “I think I should have more goals than matches,” Erling said in September 2021. His greed (in a good way) is also shown in his choice of position for punches. Holland in Dortmund every month was fixed in the role of a classic striker – if at first he captured the flanks, then this season most of his shots were from the very center of the penalty area. And their frequency is growing. But at the same time, the weight of the average shot has decreased: in the 19/20 season 0.23xG, in the next – 0.18xG.