‘Not even Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo can match him’ – Amazing Erling Haaland is already becoming a legend
Erling Haaland’s hat-trick has bored his teammates, but has left cricket pundits stunned.
Manchester City team had to sign another match ball Norwegian He scored a treble against West Ham at the weekend, his second goals in four games this season.
This takes Haaland’s total of hat-tricks to 12, and eight in the Premier League alone, moving him into joint fourth place on the all-time list.
The 24-year-old also reached the 70-goal mark in record time in the English top-flight, achieving the feat in just 69 matches.
This also left his teammates with difficulty responding, and several players signed his souvenir match ball with some amusing abuse.
Read more about Erling Haaland
Scoring at such an incredible rate since arriving in 2022 Borussia Dortmund Many have predicted that Haaland will inevitably become the Premier League’s all-time top scorer.
But it is the sheer number of hat-tricks alone that has earned him the highest praise – he has been compared to two of the greatest players of the modern era.
Reacting to Haaland getting close to the league’s top three hat-trick scorers in over 200 fewer games, the former Manchester United and Manchester City Midfielder Owen Hargreaves was also quick to praise him.
“They are legends of our sport and our league, and some of the best players ever,” he said.
“(Sergio) Aguero, (Alan) Shearer, (Robbie) Fowler, (Thierry) Henry. We are talking about the best players.
“But eight hat-tricks in 69 games, we’ve never seen anybody, not even (Lionel) Messi or (Cristiano) Ronaldo have been able to make those numbers. Really amazing.”
Former City star Stuart Pearce was similarly surprised.
“Has there been any reduction in the number of games? Is it 169?” he said. “It’s unbelievable, they are legends of our sport and one of them is producing legends.”
Commenting after the win, which left City undefeated at the top of the league with a perfect record, manager Pep Guardiola He called Haaland “unstoppable.”
“He’s playing better in everything,” Guardiola said after the match. “He stays for 20 minutes or half an hour after training sessions. Last season he wasn’t there once because he didn’t feel well – tired, sore.
“He just needs the team to give him more balls in the final third. We are going to create those situations. He is unstoppable, there is no central defender, not even a gun, to stop him.”
After the international break, Manchester City will next face Brentford on September 14.
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