Will he be the best shooter in history? How does Haaland compare to the best players his age?

Erling Haaland is a trend at the moment. The Manchester City striker is destroying everything in his path, so the question logically arises:: How many goals will Haaland actually score? He can easily give us a clue as to how the world’s biggest stars were at his age.

A goal machine. The Norwegian striker can’t be called anything else. He has scored 14 goals in eight Premier League games and 17 goals in 11 games overall.

At just 22 years old, Haaaland has already scored 152 goals and 21 more for Norway. With this staggering number, he is well on his way to becoming one of the top goalscorers in football history. But how did other icons his age fare?

Cristiano Ronaldo

At 22, Ronaldo was shining at Manchester United. He was just a season away from winning the Ballon d’Or, which he won at the age of 23 (2008). However, he had already come second the year before, with Kaká coming first.

Back then he played exclusively on the wing, more so as a right-back in a 4-4-2 formation, he wasn’t a killer in the whitewash like Haaland, hence his numbers are significantly lower. He scored his 50th career goal before his 22nd birthday.

But in some ways both players are similar, both chose Manchester club early in their careers as the best club to become a world superstar. Ronaldo later headed to Real Madrid, who are now preparing a bid for Haaland for 2024 as well.

Lionel Messi

With Messi, Haaland again shares a coach who developed their talents at the age of 22. Pep Guardiola shot Messi to footballing heights then, now he is pipping Haaland.

But even the Argentine was nowhere near Haaland’s record. Messi, at 22, had 112 starts for Barcelona, in which he scored 44 times. He too has played most of his time as a winger, and has already won La Liga 3 times and the Champions League once.

Like Ronaldo a year later, at the age of 23, he won the Ballon d’Or. And it was from then that he took off, scoring 628 goals in 666 more games for the Catalans.

Kylian Mbappé

If Ronaldo and Mbappé have dominated for more than the last decade, the reins should now be taken by Haaland and Messi. The rivalry has already begun, with the French striker emulating Haaland’s celebration after Dortmund’s elimination from the Champions League in 2020.

Mbappé is 18 months older, so he currently has more goals to his name, having netted 208 goals in 286 games.

In comparison at the same age, Haaland is better off, though not by much. The PSG striker had nine fewer goals than Haaland.

Karim Benzema

Few doubt that Karim Benzema will win the Ballon d’Or for the 2021/22 season. The French striker only broke into the top flight later in his career, exploding the most just last season when he dragged Real Madrid to win both the Champions League and La Liga.

At the age of 21, he was watched all over Europe as he netted 66 goals in 148 games for Lyon. Real Madrid won the battle for his signature with Manchester United, but in his first year Benzema only scored nine times for Los Blancos.

Robert Lewandowski

Lewandowski had the most late entry into the goalscoring elite of all those mentioned. At Haaland’s age, one of the best strikers in the world today was still playing in Poland and not much noticed by the big clubs.

Eventually he moved to Dortmund, where he started his career and from where he later moved to Bayern. At the age of 22, Lewandowski had 21 goals for Polish second division side Znicz Pruslow and 41 goals for Lech Poznan.

Source: GOAL, Transfermarkt