Man City edged Real Madrid by a point in Haaland's transfer selection
FT Desk
- 30 Sept 2022 07:32 BST
- 3 min read
Erling Haaland joined Manchester City from Borussia Dortmund for €60 million in May, but he could easily have been banging the goals in for Real Madrid instead.
Haaland has hit the ground running at the Etihad, scoring 11 Premier League goals from his first seven games at a barely fathomable rate of one every 69 minutes.
Haaland posted similar numbers in his two years with Dortmund, and was the toast of Europe when it came to light that his release clause was just €60m - Haaland is already rated at twice that by Football Transfers.
Three games, three goals. Erling Haaland makes the Premier League look easy.pic.twitter.com/BJTkUPOJQP
— Football Transfers (@Transfersdotcom) August 22, 2022
Haaland's father Alfie was a Man City midfielder in the early 2000s, and speaking in a new documentary - Haaland: The Big Decision - he explained how they settled on the English champions as the striker's next destination.
"On our list, I think City is the best team," he explained in the programme recorded a few months before Erling's move. "Munich is number two. We have Real Madrid as number three, Paris Saint-Germain as number four. We also have some English teams other than City who are quite good - Liverpool and Chelsea. Also, there is Barcelona. They are sort of in the same row."
Man Utd didn't feature
Manchester United were conspicuous by their absence. United had tried to sign Haaland from Red Bull Salzburg in 2020 before he moved to Dortmund. Alfie's former Norway teammate Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was then manager, and had also previously had Haaland Jr. at Molde.
But the Red Devils failed to score high enough on the Haalands' criteria, which included a club's need for a No.9, their playing style, manager, history and stadium capacity.
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It is believed Real Madrid pulled above Bayern into second behind City when it came to decision-time.
"I think it was one point separating the top two with the last calculations," said Alfie. "One of the criteria is about whether the club needs a No.9. City is 10 [out of 10] in that respect. Bayern Munich gets one point for that - they don’t need a No9. They have their best player as a No.9 but if he [Robert Lewandowski] goes then they have no one else."
In the event, Lewandowski did leave in a €50m move to Barcelona - not that Haaland will regret his decision. And a move to Real could still be on the cards, with Florentino Perez understood to be willing to activate Haaland's €180m release clause in 2024.
