FIFA World

Cup 2026

Erling Haaland, a striker so good he doesn’t even need to touch the ball

Erling Haaland is Norway's strike warrior Julian Finney - FIFA/FIFA via Getty Images

It had to be him.

Even during that curious period in the first half when you had to remind yourself that he was still on the pitch, there was a sense of inevitability that Erling Haaland would end up leaving his mark on Norway’s first World Cup knockout match since 1998.

Goals are the currency that Haaland trades in and his stock couldn’t be any higher in that respect. He is, quite simply, a sure thing when it comes to putting the ball in the back of the net.

Haaland has scored in each of his last 13 competitive appearances for Norway, including five in three matches at his first World Cup and the winner against Ivory Coast today. The broader numbers are astonishing: 60 goals in 53 caps for Norway. To put that record into perspective, it’s the best goals-per-game ratio of any player who has scored 50 or more for their country in the last century.

A bit more context? How about the fact that Haaland reached 60 international goals in 69 fewer appearances than Lionel Messi and 77 fewer than Cristiano Ronaldo?

But it’s not just about the goals. It’s the way he scores, too.

Haaland doesn’t do dribbling, stepovers or drop his shoulder. An elastico? He’d probably tie his hair back with that. He doesn’t shift the ball out of his feet to create half a yard of space before shooting. Haaland doesn’t take a touch full stop. He just pulls the trigger.

All five of his goals at the World Cup have been one-touch finishes. In fact, each and every one of his 14 shots registered across the games against Iraq, Senegal and Ivory Coast has been a first-time effort on goal.

Call it economical. Call it efficient. Call it instinct. Call it ruthless. Call it keeping the game simple. Call it whatever you want, but Haaland is the most natural out-and-out goalscorer of his generation. Whether he’s playing for Manchester City, or for a country that has a population of less than six million people, doesn’t change that in the slightest.

“He has something that maybe you can’t train so much – the sniff for goals, the feeling that the ball will land at your feet, or in that movement, and I think that is his biggest strength,” Norway’s head coach Stale Solbakken said on the eve of the Ivory Coast game. But he then proceeded to reel off a list of other qualities, including his physicality: Solbakken attributed that, with a smile, to Haaland’s mother, an elite track and field athlete, rather than his father, who played alongside Solbakken for Norway in the 1990s.

Either way, the sporting genes were strong in the Haaland family. The end result is the best footballer the country has ever produced and a player unlike any other in the modern game.

“He’s unique, he’s one of a kind and we’re so lucky to have him,” Kristian Thorstvedt told The Athletic after Norway’s 2-1 win which set up a last-16 tie against Brazil. “I’ve known him for so many years and he’s the same guy he’s always been outside the pitch, and he’s got the same mentality he’s always had on the pitch. He’s phenomenal.”

Watching Haaland for the first time must be a strange experience for the uninitiated. There are times when it feels as though anything other than goalscoring is largely irrelevant to him.

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After 140 seconds against Ivory Coast, Haaland connected with a header. Then he walked a lot, jogged a bit and sprinted occasionally to press an Ivory Coast defender.

The ball? Haaland didn’t come into contact with it again for another 27 minutes and 54 seconds. There’s a lot you could do in that time, including run 10,000 metres if your name is Joshua Cheptegei.

Essentially, a football match was taking place around him, which is increasingly typical of the role of the modern centre forward: stay high, occupy the centre-backs, leave space for others, and don’t run outside the width of the penalty area.

Mikel Oyarzabal knows the drill well. The Real Sociedad striker failed to touch the ball in the opening half an hour of Spain’s World Cup group game against Cape Verde.

Except the difference is that Oyarzabal isn’t Haaland – an instantly recognisable superstar of the game.

Indeed, if you were among the 69,665 people at the AT&T Stadium in Dallas on Tuesday and new to the sport, you could have been forgiven for wondering in that first 30 minutes – maybe even the opening hour, actually – what all the fuss is about with this 6ft 5in, 207lb blond-haired pony-tailed striker.

What does he actually do?

Well, for a start, he made four clearances, which was reflective of the fact that he had more touches in his own penalty area (seven) than in the Ivory Coast box (five).