Haaland could have played for England… and might have been worth even more!

FT Desk

• 11 Nov 2022 17:21 GMT
• 3 min read

Erling Haaland could have been going to the upcoming World Cup with England, but the Premier League's top scorer chose to represent Norway so will be watching from home this winter.

Haaland was born in Leeds the summer his father Alfie, a Norwegian defensive midfielder, swapped the Yorkshire club for Manchester City in a £2.5 million (€2.85m) deal.

The Haaland family returned to their native Norway four years later, Haaland senior's career petering out in Norway after an infamous horror-tackle by Roy Keane in a 2003 Manchester derby.

READ: Erling Haaland at Man City: Goals, assists, results & fixtures in 2022-23

The younger Haaland, rather unlike his father a prolific striker, started his career in Norway with Bryne and Molde before smashing goalscoring records at Red Bull Salzburg, Borussia Dortmund and latterly Man City after completing a €60m move this summer.

He has raced to 18 goals from just 12 Premier League games, and has been similarly prolific for Norway with 21 in 23 senior international outings. World Cup or not, Haaland thinks he made the right decision.

"I lived here [in England] for three-and-a-half, four years," he told Goal's YouTube programme Box to Box. "But I lived in Norway for such a long time, so it was natural for me to choose Norway.

"You never know how it might have been if my father had played longer in England, maybe I would be English! But I'm Norwegian, and I'm proud of it."

READ: The most valuable players in the world

Haaland's transfer value

Haaland was rated at €143.6 million in the most recent release by Football Transfers' in-house algorithm, making him the second highest ranked player by that measure on the database, behind Paris Saint-Germain attacker Kylian Mbappe, who is valued at €147.3m.

Four of the top 10 are English - in ascending order Phil Foden, Trent Alexander-Arnold, Harry Kane and Jude Bellingham - while five play in the Premier League, with Haaland joined by City teammate Ederson, who is the highest-valued goalkeeper.

Whilst an 'English tax' is debated in footballing circles - the notion that being English, playing in the Premier League, or both can inflate a player's value, recent research by Saxo Bank suggest that a player's valued can rocket by 300 per cent with a strong World Cup performance.

If Haaland had chosen to play for England, he would almost certainly have been going to Qatar, and given his goalscoring record, he would have undoubtedly been finding the target repeatedly. A 300 per cent increase would make Haaland's value €430.8m!