Erling Haaland is under no illusion just how much he scares Premier League centre-backs.
When you average one goal per game in the world’s strongest division for nearly three successive seasons, you have every right to exude confidence that you are the best striker in the business.
So, when Manchester City’s social media account announced Haaland’s long-term contract — that sees him commit to the club until 2034 — he had fun with it.
Penning an open letter titled “Dear defenders…” in the club’s video, he signed off with “Sorry, I’m here to stay.”
Haaland is still clearly having fun in Manchester. By his own standards, the 24-year-old’s goalscoring has dropped off in recent weeks — even going a whopping three Premier League games without a goal in December.
Still, his total of 16 league goals is the second-most this season, with no player taking more than his 85 shots. Haaland has won the Premier League Golden Boot in both seasons in England, and will put up a fight to make it three on the bounce by the end of May.
Dear defenders 🖋️ pic.twitter.com/bra8MZEhq6
— Manchester City (@ManCity) January 17, 2025
His debut season in 2022-23 could hardly have gone any better. Before mentioning the historic treble that City achieved from a team perspective, Haaland’s 36 league strikes broke the single-season Premier League goalscoring record — eclipsing Newcastle’s Andrew Cole with 34 in 1993-94.
Zooming out across his Premier League career to date, Haaland’s 79 goals have come from an average distance of just 12.2 yards with only five coming from outside the penalty area. Looking at his shot map below, you would do well to find many goals scored outside of the width of the six-yard box — such is the near-robotic regularity of his prolific finishing.
So, with the ink barely dry on a nine-and-a-half-year contract, where does this leave Haaland in the race to be the all-time Premier League top goalscorer?
Well, really the maths is simple.
Those 79 goals are a long way off Alan Shearer’s tally of 260, the leading goalscorer in the league’s record books. While Haaland’s rate of 0.99 league goals per 90 is otherworldly, players have previously found Shearer’s record difficult to catch based on the longevity of his Premier League career, spanning 14 seasons.
Haaland’s new contract gives him that longevity.
Provided he completes his full contract — and is fortunate with injuries — that would mean that Haaland would have had 12 seasons in the Premier League to break Shearer’s record. Looking at his trajectory of goals scored compared with Shearer (and the remaining top five all-time goalscorers), there is every reason to believe he can secure his name in the goalscoring history books.
“If he stays for that long, then there is no doubt he will break that record,” Shearer said to BBC Sport.
“It might be someone else’s by then – it might be Harry Kane’s or Mohamed Salah’s. But there is no doubt that if — and it is a big if because it is such a long contract taking him to 34 years old — he stays that long then he should have the Premier League record.”
Even a conservative estimate of a 20-goal average spanned across the next nine seasons would see Haaland reach the tally before his contract is up.
If we projected his current average of a 32-goal season since he arrived in England, you would expect Haaland to break the all-time record midway through the 2029-30 season — still four years away from the end of his contract.
Does his manager believe he can break more records in a City shirt?
“If he continues with the numbers since he arrived, yeah,” Guardiola said in his press conference on Friday.
“It will depend on the team and him, but it’s exceptional news for all the club. When a player decides to sign this type of contract it’s because it shows how desperate he is to be here. Agents say to sign one, two, three-year contracts but it’s proof of the trust and confidence in the club.”
It is worth drilling further into Haaland’s goalscoring trajectory compared with the Premier League’s all-time list. The 24-year-old holds the record as the fastest player to reach 50 goals (48 games), with 79 goals from 89 games being a quicker return than any of the top five players in the list as things stand,
The trends have varied from player to player, and are worthy of closer inspection.
At one end of the scale, Wayne Rooney’s tally of 208 goals in 491 Premier League appearances might not be the best goalscoring rate on the list, but his availability and longevity at the highest level were as impressive as any of his attributes with the ball at his feet
Rooney’s record is made all the more impressive when considering the different positions he played across his career — able to play as an out-and-out striker, a No. 10, out wide and as a deeper-lying midfielder in his later years — and he continues to hold the record as Manchester United’s all-time top goalscorer.
GO DEEPER
Breaking down Erling Haaland’s 100 City goals: Back-post menace, one-v-ones and the occasional screamer
Before Haaland, Andy Cole held the record with 65 games to reach 50 Premier League goals for Newcastle and Manchester United, with Cole’s career possibly acting as a warning sign to the Norwegian international.
Cole’s goalscoring ascent was sharp in his early twenties, before tapering off as his career progressed and injuries took hold. A total of 187 goals (and only one penalty) is an incredible feat, but the former England international was unable to score more than 12 goals in a single season after turning 30.
Shearer had a similarly sharp ascent in his early career, scoring 25-plus goals for four consecutive seasons from 1993-94 at Blackburn Rovers to his 1996-97 debut campaign at Newcastle United.
While still a prolific goalscorer across his career, Shearer never scored more than 25 goals beyond the 1996-97 campaign, with a consistent rate that was closer to 0.5 goals per 90 than his early return closer to 0.8 goals per 90.
Shearer celebrates scoring goal 45 of 260 – against Manchester United in April 1994 (Clive Brunskill/ALLSPORT
Shearer must have been glad to see the back of Sergio Aguero when he left City to briefly join Barcelona in 2021-22. Aguero was unrelenting in his goalscoring from the moment he arrived in 2011.
With 184 goals in 275 games, Aguero’s trajectory fell on the right side of beating Shearer’s record but the Argentina international simply ran out of time to complete the feat.
The same may be for Harry Kane, whose 213-goal haul was edging closer to the all-time record before his move to Bayern Munich in the summer of 2023 — with a trajectory that almost perfectly tracked Shearer’s at the point he moved to Germany.
If Kane were to return to England to complete unfinished business, how long might it take him to reach the magic 260? Based on his average of 21 goals in his final five seasons at Tottenham, Kane would need just over two seasons to match Shearer’s haul. You would not bet against that happening.
GO DEEPER
Erling Haaland, The Inevitable: Goal scorer, phenomenon, record breaker
In public, Haaland will no doubt discuss his desire for more silverware at Manchester City, but a long-term contract allows the 24-year-old to set his sights on those individual records that have stood for most of his lifetime.
After committing to the club for another decade, this isn’t just big news for Haaland or Manchester City fans. This news could have ripple effects across the very fabric of the Premier League.
(Header design: Eamonn Dalton; photos: Getty Images)
