Pundit Jan Aage Fjortoft has claimed that Erling Haaland has improved his aerial ability at Manchester City.
After enjoying a highly successful first season at the Manchester club, during which he won three major titles and broke numerous records along the way, the striker has carried on into this campaign in the same fashion.
After recently becoming the fastest player to score 50 Premier League goals and 40 Champions League goals in the shortest amount of time, Haaland has found himself on the end of some significant praise from one pundit, but not necessarily just for his impressive goalscoring efforts.
Fjortoft hails Haaland’s aerial threat
Speaking in a recent video shared on the ESPN UK YouTube channel, Fjortoft had this to say about Haaland.
He said: “What has most impressed me about Erling, there is still a lot of work in progress, even Erling is a work in progress. You see his heading ability is much better, scoring more goals with his head, his build-up play is better, but what I am so impressed with, we know he can score goals, we know he can get the chances at Manchester City, we know his runs are different class.
“But that he managed to always block out things, the expectations, all the records and everything, he’s always there, he’s always present. Then he had two injuries, well the same injury but two times it happened against Bournemouth, happened when he played for Norway, still managed to come back, he didn’t need time to get back in the team again. Good teammates around him, got a great manager, but it’s also down to Erling, managed to block everything else out and always produce, very impressive.”
City paid £51m to sign the 23-year-old from Borussia Dortmund back in the 2021 summer transfer window.
Since then, the Norwegian has scored 71 goals in 73 appearances across all competitions and become a crucial figure in Pep Guardiola’s squad.
Looking back on the previous Premier League campaign, Haaland ended the season having won 50 of the 100 aerial duels he was involved in.
With 13 league games under his belt so far this term, the striker has won 18 of his 35 aerial duels, which is more than any other City player has managed to win.
While the centre-forward may have become more effective in the air, it’s undeniable that as long as he keeps scoring goals on a regular basis, he’ll give his side a great chance of being more successful and lifting more trophies.
