Erling Braut Haaland (Norwegian pronunciation: [ˈæːɭɪŋ ˈbræʉt ˈhoːlɑn]; born 21 July 2000) is a professional footballer who plays as a striker for Premier League club Manchester City. Born in England, he plays for the Norway national team. Regarded as one of the best players in the world and the greatest Norwegian player of all time, he is known for his speed, strength, positioning, and finishing inside the box.
Haaland began his senior career with Norwegian clubs Bryne and Molde before signing for Red Bull Salzburg in 2019, where he won the Austrian Bundesliga and Austrian Cup. His performances in the UEFA Champions League earned him a move to Bundesliga club Borussia Dortmund in 2020, where he won the DFB-Pokal in 2021 and was named Bundesliga Player of the Season. In 2022, Haaland joined Manchester City for a fee of €60 million (£51.2 million) and played a pivotal role in the club's treble-winning debut season, becoming only the second English club to achieve the feat. He finished as the top scorer in the Premier League, FA Cup and Champions League, setting records for the most goals in a Premier League season (36) and the most goals by a Premier League player in all competitions in a single season (52). At City, he has won two Premier League titles and three Premier League Golden Boots.
Haaland's individual honours include the PFA Players' Player of the Year, the UEFA Men's Player of the Year, the IFFHS World's Best Player and the Golden Boy awards, while he also finished runner-up for the Ballon d'Or. He is the only player to win the awards for Premier League Young Player and Player of the Season in the same season. He is also the quickest Premier League player to score eight hat-tricks. He was included in the FIFPRO World 11 for 2021, 2022, 2023, and 2024.
Haaland represented Norway at the youth level, winning the Golden Boot at the 2019 FIFA U-20 World Cup, where he scored a record nine goals in a single match. He made his senior international debut for Norway in 2019, and has since scored 62 goals in 54 appearances, making him Norway's all-time top goalscorer. Haaland is the sixth player to reach 50 international goals in under 50 appearances, doing so in 46 games. At the 2026 FIFA World Cup, Haaland helped Norway reach the quarter-finals—the nation's best-ever World Cup finish—scoring seven goals.
Erling Braut Haaland was born on 21 July 2000 in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England, while his father Alfie Haaland was playing football for Leeds United. As a result, Haaland grew up as a supporter of Leeds. In 2004, at age three, he moved to Bryne, his parents' hometown in Norway.
His mother, Gry Marita Braut, was a national heptathlon champion in Norway in the 1990s. In addition to football, Haaland participated in various other sports as a child, including handball, golf, and track and field. He also reportedly achieved a world record in his age category for the standing long jump when he was five, with a recorded distance of 1.63 metres (5 ft 4 in).
Haaland started playing at the academy of his hometown club Bryne at the age of five. Five of the players from this youth team went on play on Norway youth national teams. During the 2015 and 2016 seasons, he played for Bryne 2 (Bryne's reserve team) in the Norwegian fourth tier, scoring 18 goals in 18 matches. The following season he scored his first career hat-trick at the age of 16. In May 2016, Gaute Larsen was fired as Bryne manager, and youth coach Berntsen was promoted to caretaker manager. Having worked closely with Haaland in other youth teams, the interim manager handed the teenager his first start, three months before his 16th birthday. His first game with Bryne FK was a second-tier 1. divisjon match against Ranheim on 12 May.
After initially being deployed as a winger, Berntsen put Haaland in his favoured central role as a striker after a few matches. Although he failed to score in his breakthrough season at Bryne, Haaland was offered a trial by German club TSG Hoffenheim before eventually moving to Molde to play under Ole Gunnar Solskjær. Haaland made 16 senior appearances for Bryne.
On 1 February 2017, Molde announced the signing of the 16-year-old Haaland. He made his debut for the club on 26 April in a Norwegian Cup match against Volda TI, scoring once in a 3–2 win. Haaland's debut in the Eliteserien came on 4 June. He came on as a substitute in the 71st minute against Sarpsborg 08, and he received a yellow card within two minutes. On 6 August, Haaland scored the winning goal against Tromsø IL, his first goal in the league. On 17 September, he scored the winning goal as Molde defeated Viking FK 3–2. After the game, Haaland received criticism from his teammate Björn Bergmann Sigurðarson for celebrating his goal towards Viking supporters in a "provoking" manner. Haaland finished his first season at Molde with four goals in 20 appearances.
On 1 July 2018, Haaland scored four goals in the opening 21 minutes against Brann, securing his team a 4–0 victory over the unbeaten league leaders at the time. After the match, Molde manager Ole Gunnar Solskjær compared Haaland's style of play to Belgian forward Romelu Lukaku, and said the club had rejected several bids for the striker from different clubs. In the following match a week later, Haaland continued his scoring run with two goals against Vålerenga in a 5–1 win. He scored his first goal in UEFA competition on 26 July, converting a penalty in Molde's 3–0 Europa League qualifying victory against KF Laçi. Due to a sprained ankle, Haaland did not participate in Molde's last three league matches of the season. For his performances in the 2018 Eliteserien, Haaland received the Eliteserien Breakthrough of the Year award. He finished the 2018 season as Molde's top goalscorer, scoring 16 goals in 30 matches across all competitions.
On 19 August 2018, Austrian Bundesliga champions Red Bull Salzburg announced that Haaland would join the club on 1 January 2019, signing a five-year contract. The Athletic's Phil Hay would later reveal that prior to his move to Salzburg, Haaland was also subject of an offer from his father's former club Leeds United. He made his debut for the club on 17 February, the 2018–19 Austrian Cup quarter-finals against Wiener Neustadt, and scored his first goal on 12 May in the Austrian Bundesliga 2–1 win over LASK.
On 19 July, he scored his first hat-trick for the club in a 7–1 Austrian Cup win against SC-ESV Parndorf, and followed this up with his first hat-trick in the league on 10 August, scoring three in a 5–2 victory against Wolfsberger AC. He got a third hat-trick for Salzburg on 14 September in a 7–2 victory over TSV Hartberg; this was the sixth consecutive league game Haaland had scored in, with 11 total goals. Three days later, Haaland made his debut in the UEFA Champions League against Genk, where he scored three goals in the first half of an eventual 6–2 victory, his fourth overall hat-trick for Salzburg, becoming the only player to score a first-half hat-trick on competition debut.
In his next two matches of the Champions League season, Haaland recorded a goal against Liverpool at Anfield and a further two against Napoli, becoming only the second teenager after Karim Benzema in the history of the competition to score in each of his first three appearances. His six goals were also the most scored by any player in their first three Champions League matches. After converting a penalty in Salzburg's reverse fixture against Napoli, Haaland became the first teenager to score in his first four matches in the competition, and only the fourth player of any age to achieve this feat, following Zé Carlos, Alessandro Del Piero and Diego Costa. He then scored all three goals in Salzburg's 3–0 victory at Wolfsberger AC on 10 November, recording his fifth hat-trick of the season and his second against the club.
On 27 November, Haaland came off the bench to score another goal against Genk, joining Del Piero, Serhiy Rebrov, Neymar, Cristiano Ronaldo and Robert Lewandowski as the only players to score in the first five matches of a Champions League group stage, and becoming the first teenager to score in five consecutive matches in the competition. However, he would fail to find the net in Salzburg's final group match against Liverpool, as his team lost 2–0 and were eliminated from the competition. This would prove to be Haaland's final game for the club; he departed Salzburg having recorded 29 goals, with 28 of these coming in only 22 appearances made during the 2019–20 season.