FOOTBALL: Erling Haaland compared to Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo

Erling Haa­land con­tin­ues his sen­sa­tion­al form by scor­ing his third Pre­mier League hat-trick in his eighth game for Man­ches­ter City.

This time it’s Man­ches­ter Unit­ed who fall vic­tim, and the Nor­we­gian has scored 17 goals in the der­by this sea­son. Haa­land has long shown a hunger for goals, but his per­for­mances at the Eti­had con­tin­ue to sur­prise giv­en Eng­lish foot­bal­l’s adap­ta­tion to the top leagues.

The 22-year-old Nor­we­gian seems to be on the verge of mak­ing his­to­ry, break­ing records week after week. The one-sea­son record cur­rent­ly held by Mohamed Salah could be beat­en at Haa­land’s cur­rent pace as City and the sum­mer sign­ing look relent­less. Haa­land has already scored 172 goals for the club, 103 of them in the last 100 games and 21 in his home country.

The age at which Haa­land start­ed mak­ing big num­bers meant he was ahead of the curve expe­ri­enced by bench­mark Lionel Mes­si and Cris­tiano Ronal­do, but until they start­ed scor­ing with incred­i­ble reg­u­lar­i­ty. a lit­tle behind in his career.

Haa­land has already drawn com­par­isons to Mes­si, with Pep Guardi­o­la com­ment­ing after his debut that “(Haa­land) has the will to be a bet­ter play­er (than Mes­si)”. He likes foot­ball and has nev­er seen a 21- or 22-year-old play­er. Mes­si may have already made progress, but oth­er play­ers are nev­er per­fect and there is always room for improvement. ”

The Argen­tin­ian, who has won the most Bal­lon d’Or in his­to­ry, came to the top a lit­tle lat­er than Haa­land, so the Nor­we­gian’s num­bers are a bit off. Mes­si was trained as a winger at La Masia, where he was includ­ed in the first team for the first time.

That year, Mes­si scored 91 goals in 193 appear­ances for teams that includ­ed Samuel Eto’o and Thier­ry Hen­ry. His con­tri­bu­tion to LaLi­ga and Cham­pi­ons League tri­umphs set him apart from the still unproven Haaland.

Mes­si’s career sky­rock­et­ed short­ly after his 22nd birth­day, going on to score 628 goals in 666 appear­ances. His deci­sion to spend most of his career at Barcelona means that almost all of the club’s records and most of LaLi­ga’s records belong to him.

Like Mes­si, Ronal­do did­n’t trans­form into the play­er he was until his ear­ly twen­ties. Achiev­ing that in his late teens will be a strength that can be quan­ti­fied when his career comes to an end.

At 22, Ronal­do was already sec­ond in the Bal­lon d’Or, los­ing to Kaka in 2007 but win­ning it a year lat­er. The Por­tuguese star, who emerged as a new play­er after the 2006 World Cup, had a glo­ri­ous year in 2007 when he helped Unit­ed win the title.

As an indi­vid­ual, the No. 7 has scored 47 goals for his club by the age of 22. Like Mes­si, Ronal­do was also a winger, but his move to a more cen­tral posi­tion has achieved his goal feat. Real Madrid had the Por­tuguese star in his prime, win­ning a total of five Euro­pean titles, keep­ing him apart from Messi.

City appre­ci­ates this new force. The Nor­we­gian is seen as one of the heirs to the throne long shared by Ronal­do and Messi.

22 year old club goals
Erling Haa­land: 172

Cris­tiano Ronal­do: 47

Lionel Mes­si: 91

Domes­ti­cal­ly, he may not last long enough to chal­lenge the num­bers of Alan Shear­er or Har­ry Kane, but his stock could out­per­form them. Many peo­ple cite Thier­ry Hen­ry as the great­est Pre­mier League play­er of all time, but John Ter­ry has sug­gest­ed Haa­land could sur­pass him.

He told Bein Sports: “Ear­ly on he shout­ed that he could be the great­est play­er in the his­to­ry of the Pre­mier League. I’ve nev­er seen a play­er this young have the desire to score goals like him. Any­way, I’m persistent.