PREMIER LEAGUE
Erling Haaland scores twice against Chelsea: who has scored 50 Premier League goals in the fewest games?
The Manchester City striker already holds a host of English top-flight and Champions League records, and will soon add another to his collection.
After Erling Haaland joined Manchester City in the summer of 2022, it soon felt as he was breaking records in every single match he played. In the Premier League, he became the fastest player to score two, three, four and five hat-tricks, the first to score hat-tricks in three consecutive home games and now holds the record for most goals in a league season.
In the Champions League, he became the first and so far only player to score a first-half hat-trick on his debut and scored 10, 15, 20, 25, 30 and 35 goals in the competition in fewer games than any other player in history.
Haaland gets to 49 Premier League goals against Chelsea
It probably won’t come as a surprise to hear that the Norwegian is on the brink of claiming another ‘fastest player to X goals” record in the Premier League. Haaland’s double in Sunday’s thriller against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge took him onto 48 and 49 goals in the English top flight, which led to analysis company Opta digging out the list of players who had gone before him who had netted 50 times in the fewest games.
Which players have been fastest to 50 Premier League goals?
The man who (still) leads the way, but probably not for long, is former Newcastle United and Manchester United frontman Andy Cole, whose single-season scoring record Haaland broke last season. The ex-England international scored 34 times in 40 matches (there were 22 teams) in his debut Premier League season in 1993-94 and needed 65 games to reach 50, narrowly beating Alan Shearer (66), who achieved it while playing for Blackburn Rovers, and Ruud van Nistelrooy (68), who Cole played with at United for a few months before leaving.
Against which team could Haaland score his 50th Premier League goal?
Unless something utterly bizarre happens, ‘fastest to 50 Premier League goals’ will be another record for Haaland to add to his rather lengthy list. The Norwegian has now scored 49 goals in only 47 Premier League fixtures and will see City’s next fixture, a mouthwatering home game against Liverpool on Saturday 25 November, as the perfect occasion to reach the half-century.