NATIONS LEAGUE
Haaland becomes Norway’s all-time top scorer
The Manchester City striker was on target twice for Norway against Slovenia, and overtakes Jørgen Juves’ 90-year-old national team record.
Norway went into this month’s international break without captain Martin Ødegaard, but with Erling Haaland in spectacular form. The Scandinavians will play two games in this window, both Nations League games - this evening’s against Slovenia which corresponds to matchday 3 and Sunday’s trip to Austria in matchday 4.
Stale Solbakken’s side top Group 3 in League B and strengthened their position after putting three past Slovenia in Oslo. It turned out to be an historic night for Norwegian football and particularly for Haaland, who found the net twice - he opened the scoring on seven minutes then made it 3-0 on the hour after Alexander Sorloth had extended the team’s lead at the start of the second half.
Haaland makes history with Norway
Haaland’s first goal brought him level with Jørgen Juves, who for almost a century has been Norway’s top goal scorer. The Man City striker’s second goal took him past Juves to claim the record outright.
Juves scored 33 goals for Norway’s men’s team in 41 appearances between March 1928 and June 1937, his final goal for the national team was in June 1934, precisely at the Ullevaal - the same stadium where Haaland would take his record 90 years later.
Norway's all-time top goal scorers (appearances in brackets)
- 34 Erling Haaland (36)
- 33 Jørgen Juves (41)
- 26 Einar Gundersen (33)
- 25 Harald Ove Hennum (43)
- 24 John Carew (91)
- 23 Ole Gunnar Solskjær (67)
- 23 Tore André Flo (76)
- 22 Gunnar Thoresen (62)
- 21 Steffen Iversen (79)
- 20 Joshua King (62)
Haaland record breaker
Juves was 27 when he set the record but despite being three years younger, Erling has already overtaken him having played five games less. His strike rate is also superior - 0.94 compared to Juves’ 0.73. It’s clear that Haaland will go on to set a record that will become almost impossible to beat.
Below both players in the historic ranking are some names that will be very familiar to European football fans - Ole Gunnar Solskjær, Steffen Iversen, John Carew and Tore André Flo - all of who are no longer active.
Haaland already possesses numerous records at club level with Manchester City and in European competition. Haaland became the first player to score multiple times on his Champions League debut for three different clubs. He is also the youngest player to score 40 goals in the tournament’s history
He is currently the leading scorer in the Premier League with 10 goals in seven games. He finished his first season at the Etihad with 52 goals and followed that up with 38 in his second season.