Erling Haaland was labelled a “monster” after becoming just the third player to score five goals in a Champions League match as Manchester City thumped RB Leipzig 7-0 at the Etihad.
The 22-year-old is both the fastest and youngest player to have reached the 30-goal mark in the competition and has 33 in total from only 25 matches for City, Borussia Dortmund and Red Bull Salzburg.
His five goals also brought up a fifth hat-trick of his debut season in England as Haaland became the first Premier League player to do so since Harry Kane for Spurs in 2016-17.
Haaland’s clinical performance prompted media across Europe to marvel at a striker who looks almost impossible to stop.
“Why didn’t Barca sign Haaland?” asked Spanish media outlet Sport, who crowned him as “the monster who destroys all records” while Marca said his display sent a “statement message to the rest of Europe”.
French newspaper L’Equipe, meanwhile, called him “the best rebounder in the world”, with four of his finishes coming from rebounds off the woodwork or saves from the goalkeeper.
Haaland surpassed Arjen Robben (32 goals), Luis Suarez and Antoine Griezmann (both 31) in the Champions League’s all-time top scorer charts, moving level with former Liverpool and Real Madrid striker Fernando Morientes in 23rd place in the charts.
The next milestone in Haaland’s sights will be to become the youngest player to reach 40 goals, currently held by PSG’s Kylian Mbappe, the man he is tipped to challenge for future Ballon’s d’Or. Cristiano Ronaldo is the all-time top scorer in the Champions League with 141 goals, followed by Lionel Messi on 129.
Haaland looked on course to become the first player in Champions League history to score six goals in a game but was substituted after 63 minutes.
It was a decision that was criticised by Germany’s most capped player ever Lothar Matthäus.
“I didn’t understand that Haaland was substituted after 63 minutes,” he told Sky Sport Austria.
“He could have created history. Messi has already scored five goals in one game in the Champions League. Haaland would have had half an hour for a sixth. That’s the only thing that bothered me a bit today. Otherwise, the Haaland show was of course sensational.”
Messi, who scored five times for Barcelona against Bayer Leverkusen in 2012 and Luiz Adriano who did likewise for Shakhtar Donetsk against BATE Borisov in 2014, are the only other players to have achieved the feat.
Haaland also became the most prolific scorer in a single season for City, beating the previous record of 38 in all competitions set by Tommy Johnson in 1928-29.
The free-scoring striker is also on course to smash the record for most Premier League goals in a season held by Alan Shearer and Andy Cole at 34 (back when there were 42 matches) and Mo Salah’s 33 goals in a 38-game campaign. He is currently on 28 with 11 fixtures to go.
Analysis: Haaland’s five goals weren’t even his best moments
By Daniel Storey, i‘s chief football writer
Sit down for this, in case it makes you topple over with laughter: the moments on Tuesday night when Haaland demonstrated his domineering, bullying, monstrous best came before, after and in between his five goals: the surging runs beyond three defenders, the headers won, the pressure applied. That is the magnitude of what we are dealing with here, a goalscorer of such freakishness that everything else looks less than ordinary.
But more than any of that, it is Haaland’s nose for danger that is better than anyone else in the game. It is often said that Haaland only scores goals, and he is certainly one-dimensional by Manchester City standards. But if you think that being in the right place at the right time when the ball rebounds, bounces, or bobbles to you involves any more than 10 per cent good fortune, think on.
Totally mesmerising!
— Football on BT Sport (@btsportfootball) March 15, 2023
Erling Haaland's 5 goals against Leipzig is one of the most dominant performances the #UCL has ever seenpic.twitter.com/h1Fmz0klpk
Watch him when he’s barely involved in the game; he’s always tracking the movement of the ball, his teammates and the defenders tasked with stopping him, like a CCTV system flashing between different cameras. He does it over and over and over again, for a reason. He knows where to be and when. Don’t worry too much about the rest. The height and power and pace and skill and wires and cogs will see to that.
The sheer volume of goals is obscene. He is now inside the top 25 goalscorers in the history of the European Cup and he has played 25 matches (he has 68 more matches to score the one goal required to move ahead of Fernando Morientes, with whom he shares 23rd place).
Haaland has 39 for the season, which is a) completely and utterly ridiculous, and b) more than any Manchester City player has ever scored in a season before. Haaland could still play another 19 matches before the curtain falls on one of the most extraordinary individual campaigns we will ever witness.
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