Fair, and we'll never know if they'd be able to post similar numbers if they were deployed as forwards earlier.
Nordic Ghost Yeti (Scandi Carroll) | Haaland at City
- Thread starter Samid
- Start date
Dunno. Messi was pissed off starting as a winger for Barca as he always saw himself as a nr 10 which isnt surprising when he broke all records as a false nr.9
You're mistaking much more complete for much better.
I think it'll be the same discussion all over again with goals against general contribution, only that Mbappe as the better playmaker of the two isn't even close to Messi in that regard and Haaland is even more focused on goals than Cristiano. So overall a bit meh.
Which is why I still hope for other players. Wirtz, Pedri, Musiala, Gavi or Endrick are much more exciting players, IMO. Or from the previous "generation" of talents, I still have hopes for Sancho, Ödegaard and Joao Felix. Let's leave the goal obsession behind
You've gotta be kidding here.I think it'll be the same discussion all over again with goals against general contribution, only that Mbappe as the better playmaker of the two isn't even close to Messi in that regard and Haaland is even more focused on goals than Cristiano. So overall a bit meh.
Which is why I still hope for other players. Wirtz, Pedri, Musiala, Gavi or Endrick are much more exciting players, IMO. Or from the previous "generation" of talents, I still have hopes for Sancho, Ödegaard and Joao Felix. Let's leave the goal obsession behind
Nope. Most people don't even know or remember that.
Been trying to explain this but he's stuck on this idea that Haaland's numbers are unlike anything we've seen before. It's obviously false but people can believe whatever they want.
Your debating style is… interesting, to say the least. Maybe it’s just you that doesn’t remember things like that.
I doubt that. Muller was probably the most clutch pure goalscorer ever.
I mean it's obviously the case that Cole is not underrated because of not taking penalties. When you are the second most prolific goalscorer in PL history (which he was at retirement, he's since been surpassed) you've scored enough goals to be lauded, with or without penalties. There's many other much more important factors, some of which I won't go into here and others that do bear mentioning. Like for example Glenn Hoddle saying that he needed 5 chances to score a goal, a slight which subsequently gained traction and which Cole spent a large part of his autobiography complaining about. But again, feel free to believe what you want.
Last edited:
Nice work digging up an article from 2019 with stats from 2019 to tell us Mbappe had him beat in these years (before Haaland started playing CL football, and Mbappe being 21, so not so strange Messi took over from there either)
Haaland played his first CL campaign in the 19/20 at 19, while Mbappe played his first in the 16/17 season when he turned 18.
Let's lay out their numbers in the CL:
Haaland at 22: 33 goals in 1866 minutes (25 games) - 57 minutes per goal
1st season (19 years old) - 10 goals in 554 minutes (8 games) - 55 minutes per goal.
2nd season (20 years old) - 10 goals in 706 minutes (8 games) - 71 minutes per goal.
3rd season (21 years old) - 3 goals in 203 muntes (3 games) - 68 minutes per goal.
4th season (22 years old) - 10 goals in 403 minutes (6 games) - 40 minutes per goal. He's also still in the comp.
Mbappe after the 20/21 season when he had turned 22: 27 goals in 3447 minutes (45 games) - 128 minutes per goal
1st season (18 years old) - 6 goals in 536 minutes (9 games) - 89 minutes per goal.
2nd season (19 years old) - 4 goals in 658 minutes (8 games) - 165 minutes per goal.
3rd season (20 years old) - 4 goals in 701 muntes (3 games) - 175 minutes per goal.
4th season (21 years old) - 5 goals in 652 minutes (6 games) - 130 minutes per goal.
5th season (22 years old) - 8 goals in 900 minutes (6 games) - 113 minutes per goal.
Messi had 25 goals in 3436 minutes (44 games) after the 09/10 season just before he turned 23 - 137 minutes per goal
Cristiano had 11 goals in 3267 minutes (40 games) after the 07/08 season (turned 23 in february that season) - 297 minutes per goal
R9 had 1 goal in 6 games at this age.
Then you give us Messi's total clubnumbers from being 22 and 23 years old, which is clearly showing that he had a lower scoring rate than Haaland at 22 (42 goals in 37 games).
Messi 09/10: 47 goals in 4402 minutes (53 games) - 94 minutes per goal
Messi 10/11: 53 goals in 4579 minutes (55 games) - 92 minutes per goal
Haaland 22/23 (so far): 42 goals in 2871 minutes (37 games) - 68 minutes per goal (!)
Then you mention Messi's peak seasons:
Messi 11/12: 73 goals in 5221 minutes (60 games) - 72 minutes per goal
Messi 12/13: 60 goals in 4070 minutes (50 games) - 68 minutes per goal (Best ever in Europe in modern football)
I mean.... impossible?
National team career-stats:
Haaland for Norway: 21 goals in 1845 minutes (23 games) - 88 minutes per goal
Mbappe for France: 36 goals in 4945 minutes (66 games) - 137 minutes per goal
Messi for Argentina: 98 goals in 14284 minutes (172 games) - 146 minutes per goal
CR7 for Portugal: 118 goals in 15488 minutes (196 games) - 131 minutes per goal
R9 for Brazil: 62 goals in 7742 minutes (99 games) - 125 minuts per goal
Gerd Muller had a fantastic record for West Germany though: 68 goals in 5528 minutes (62 games) - 81 minutes per goal
Let's see if Haaland can beat that for Norway in the end (He has 14 goals in 893 minutes (11 games) - 64 minutes per goal, for Norway since the start of the 21/22 season )
It just facts, nothing more.
No one has been scoring at Haalands rate in the top 5 leagues in Europe, not in the last 70 years at least.
That article is from 2019.
Here are the current Champions League records Haaland holds
Youngest to 15 goals – 20y 126d
Quickest to 15 goals – 12 games
Youngest to 20 goals – 20y 231d
Quickest to 20 goals – 14 games
Youngest to 25 goals – 22y 47d
Quickest to 25 goals – 20 games
Youngest to 30 goals – 22y 236d
Quickest to 30 goals – 25 games
Only player to score first-half hat-trick on competition debut
Only player to score multiple times in four consecutive appearances
Only player to score more than one goal on competition debut for three different clubs
Champions League records in Haaland's sights
Youngest to 40 goals – Kylian Mbappé (23y 317d)
Haaland has 7 goals left to overake Mbappes breakout record of 40 and 400 days of CL football to do it.
Haaland is currently scoring at a higher pace than Leo Messis record year of 73. He wont break it since he wont feature in enough games, but the poster you replied to was correct.
This discussion is purely about goalscoring, there isnt any conversation on the planet where anyone suggests Haaland is better than Leo Messi so lets not entertain that whatabout.
Hilarious. It started off being 'modern football' (false) and now it's 'since 1950 in the top 5 Euro leagues' (also false, and completely ignoring the fact that there was no 'top 5 leagues' concept for most of that 70 year period. Let's chat when Haaland scores 91 goals in a calendar year. The most he's got so far is, what? 40? 50?
First he could try to beat Muller's 85 from 1972, that would be a good starting point, before tackling Messi's 91. Then he could go for the real record, which is Pele's 127 goals in 1959. I'll be watching to see how he does.
Does Pele's goals record in 1959 count friendlies at club level?
Edit:, looking up his stats pele didnt score 127 goals in 1959. He scored 65.
Last edited:
I dont quite understand why you are so negative towards discussing current numbers instead of going "Oh lets talk when he breaks an all time record". The poster you replied to in agreement before this cited an aricle from 2019. My response right above this lets you know Mbappe currently does not hold the records. Haaland does. Since he scores more goals.
Okay but what has he won? Even Weghorst has a Carling cup to his name
Okay but what has he won? Even Weghorst has a Carling cup to his name
Wout has more English titles than Haaland for sure.
I haven't made any claims about Mbappe scoring more goals than anyone in the last 70 years so I'm not sure what you mean.
This is what you responded to: https://www.redcafe.net/threads/nor...n-single-season-for-city.470426/post-30320485
The claim in the response was false. Haalands goal tally thus far is 42 in 37. That is 1.13 goals per game.
The game has not seen scoring like this in Europe at the age of 22. Leo Messis record goalscoring seasons of 73 in 60 is 1.21GPG. That barely inches ahead of Haalands current season at a younger age.
Mbappes CL goalscoring records have all been comfortably beaten.
He scored 127. It does count friendlies but the but the odd desire for excluding them is a modern quirk. That figure includes goals in games against 15 or so European sides including European Cup Champions Real Madrid (in a game to decide who was really the best team in the world), Barcelona, Sporting Lisbon, Feyenoord, Valencia and Inter Milan.
False
Now consider the gap in the rest of the stats.
Needs 23 more for Dixie Dean levels.
Ok I wish to be educated. Who at the age of 22 scored more goals at a higher rate in their 22nd year than Haaland is currently doing in Europe?
Why?
Because there are stats beyond goals that point to the overall influence of the player. If you ask me, I'd happily take Haaland but given the option, I'd rather have Henry because he would make us much more dangerous. Players like Haaland are fantastic when your team is dominant because they'd give a meaning to the attack but if your team isn't that good, it's like playing with 10 men. A striker like Henry does not solely depend on service.
Would you rate a high goalscoring average from let's say in the Paulista or the Hungarian league in the 50' or 60' as high as the German, Spanish, English, Italian and French (might actually fall out of the top 5 leagues after this season) in todays football? Football at clublevel wasn't nearly as competetive in the good old days as it is today, which makes it less interesting to compare numbers between eras, even from the 50' and 60'. Hence why "modern football" is the most relevant to compare with, in my book. There is no shame in acknowledging what he's doing, and there's no guarantee he'll keep up his scoringratio going forward, but so far it's the best goalscorer you and I have ever seen for his age. If you disagree, please present the names and numbers for the players with a higher minute/goal ratio at 22 than Haaland has had since he broke through and Salzburg or Dortmund if you like. Nobody is calling him an all time great yet, but he's on an all time great path so far in his career. For goalscorers that is.
In official matches Pele scored 64 goals (Santos and Brazil) in 1959. Where do you get your numbers from? He played around 40 friendlies with his allstar team as well, are you counting friendly matches too?
Pelè didn't even play most of his matches for Santos in the top national tier in Brazil, but in the Paulista (which had 3-5 really good teams and around 15 average to really bad teams from the Sao Paolo region in it). He scored 468 of his 643 official goals for Santos in the Paulista.That's:
468 goals in 410 games in the Paulista (1,14 goals/game), 49 goals in 53 games in the Rio/Sao Paolo play offs (0,92 goals/game) and 126 goals in 196 games in Serie A (top tier in Brazil) and continental/intercontinental cups (0,64 goals/game). Level of competition matters. Would you imagine?
Muller was 27 in 1972 (fantastic season, he scored 29 goals in 14 cup games in the fall of 72' alone)
Messi was 25, and that record will be tough to beat, both because of the high goalscoring ratio (66 minutes per goal) and the number of matches he played (69)
Haaland has a ratio of 68 minutes/goal so far this season at 22, if Norway ever qualifies for a championsship I shouldn't be impossible to beat those records somewhere down the line, but it would be one hell of an achievement for a player playing for Norway. The club records are more realistic.
It might be an odd modern quirk, but we dont count friendly club games. Are we going to count to goals he scored against the military teams as well or do they count only when playing strong opposition in club friendlies. Dunno if we have to back to Pele´s 1300 tally that he claimed himself. Doesnt mean that there cant be nuance involved regarding the friendlies you mentioned its just, if we have to do it for Pelé we have to do it for everyone as well. I prefer the way we do it now.
Last edited:
I don't know about the rate. I go by goals per game because the MPG stats are not accurate or not known for many players in the 20th century. But on GPG since the 50s (I'll leave out anyone before then even though there's a few), Muller had 43 goals in 45 games at age 22, Eusebio had 46 goals in 28 games at age 22. More recently Romario scored 31 goals in 27 games at age 23/24. I know that's not quite 22 but you've presented very narrow parameters. I particularly take issue with the notion that only goals scored in Europe have any value. No reason to make this distinction for much of the last 70 years.
Basically, the top goalscorers in history score about a goal a game for their careers (or usually slightly less, 0.8 or 0.9). There's a few insane outliers like Peyroteo, but mostly that's the area, and that's where Haaland is now. He's not doing anything that hasn't been seen before but I'm going to stop saying that now because so many people on this this thread seem heavily invested in believing that he is.
He didn't claim it himself, it's literally a Guiness record. This is what I mean about the contextual ignorance of history. No disrespect.
Sure. Mine was a post comparing scoring records though, responding to another post that did the same. In the wider context I don't really need to look at the stats to tell me that Messi's a far, far better player. He is and obviously so. That doesn't necessarily translate into Messi being a more efficient goalscorer though.
I don't particularly disagree that someone like Henry is a better all round player either, but I would dispute the idea that Haaland is obviously less effective or solely dependent on service. To start with he's also a phenomenal scavenger; able to pick the bones of situations others are unable to so regularly do. In such a way he kind of does provide for himself because of his weird ability to always be in the right place to capitalise on mistakes/goalmouth chaos. It's not particularly spectacular but it's nevertheless a pretty rare and highly effective commodity to have.
He also affects the service itself. His movement, speed, strength and agility means that serving him, specifically, is that much easier than serving someone else. He's much more available for more types of service than most. He's as at home receiving a high cross as he is a pullback or a through ball. What's more, because of his physical gifts those crosses don't have to be as pinpoint nor the through balls as perfectly weighted etc. Essentially he'll get on the end of more stuff than any alternative player in his position, as well as tuck it away with greater regularity.
So while Henry might be better at dribbling through a defence or putting in a beautiful pass for another to score, he's not getting on the end of as many headers or outmuscling a defender as often or as successfully reading the moment and popping up to inevitably score the rebound. He's a different type of player and he's doing more beautiful things, sure, but I'm not sure that beauty is necessarily more effective.
I don’t think that’s true, you can enjoy watching Haaland at his craft and equally enjoy a Hazard or a Ronaldinho. Some people are determined to undermine Haaland at every opportunity also and diminish goals. There’s more to football than goals but also goals matter.
If Messi wasn’t a goalscorer then you could make the argument about Muller to prove your contrived point but Messi is as good a goalscorer while being better at assisting and dribbling too.
How is the desire for more information through statistics correlated with people getting dumber?
Just for clarity and context here: there was no Série A for most of Pelé's domestic career. The "top tier" league wasn't formed until 1970. Pelé only played in this league at the age of 30+.
There's no way Haaland surpasses Gerd Muller. He has the best resume of a striker in football history. Literally achieved everything and scored in every important game in his career. There's no black mark in his career.
Totally with you on that. It's like saying Mbappe is much better than Andy Murray. At tennis, he almost certainly isn't.
His point I think is that in the past, the person who scored the most goals was not necessarily seen as the best player. E.g. Cruyff and Beckenbauer being considered the best footballers around at that time (and also Best before he fell off) and not Muller. If a person who did score the most goals was seen as the best player, it's because they did a lot of other stuff as well, and there was a high proportion of their goals that were brilliant or beautiful, like Pele or Puskas or DiStefano. Pure poachers were not put on that kind of level.
Now there is a much greater obsession with stats. Football is a spectator sport after all; whilst it is enjoyable to see a player scoring a simple goal, it's much more enjoyable to see players exhibiting great skill that we couldn't do ourselves. That's supposed to be the point of watching the sport, no?. Anyone can tap a ball in from 2 yards out. Obviously most of us (and most players) do not have the energy to keep making the runs that lead to easy goals or the IQ to read the game and continuously get into positions where they can score easy and frequent goals but that doesn't change the fact that it is not as stirring to the spectator as what the great geniuses of the game can do.
I agree on the Beckenbauer/Cruyff bit but also Gerd Muller:
Won the Ballon d’Or, finished 2nd, finished 3rd twice
Voted the best player in Bundesliga history
Twice footballer of the year
8 time World soccer of the year
World Cup and European Championships team of the tournament
So it’s not like he wasn’t considered one of the best of his generation, in fact I’d say he was clearly 3rd and top 15 of all time no matter what way you look at it. And if he hadn’t been competing with Beckenbauer and Cruyff and was 5 years younger, he may have won 3-4 Ballon d’Ors in the late 70s/early 80s.
That’s disrespectful to Muller and Haaland that anyone can do what they do, in fact almost nobody in history can, hence their records.
There was national play-offs from 1959, which numbers I put in that bracket, together with C libertadores and Club WC. 89 of those 173 matches on the top tier on domestic level were played before he turned 30 (1959-70). The play-offs were between 5 and 17 games each season before the League were formed.
The point was that he scored most of his goals against cannon fodder in the Paulista and produced more human numbers when he met better teams more regularly. Santos saw double digits in the Paulista every other year and had multible 7+ wins every season. The Paulista cannot be compared to the best leagues in the world today, even though two-three of the best teams in the world at the time played there. It's like having a 16-20 team League with only teams from the London region.