Manchester City assistant Kolo Toure spoke about the improvements that Erling Haaland can make to become even better
Erling Haaland has been backed to give more sleepless nights to Premier League defenders after ‘scaring’ his Manchester City coaches. The No.9 broke Alan Shearer’s longstanding record this month to become the quickest player to 100 Premier League goals and has his sights on more after netting at the Bernabeu in midweek.
Haaland has scored at an incredible rate since he came to English football in 2022 and has not let up, with this season threatening to be his most prolific yet. The Norwegian has 15 league goals after 13 games as he chases the record of 38 that he set in his first year with the Blues.
Sunday will be one of his toughest tests of the season, against a high-flying Crystal Palace side who have one of the meanest defences. Oliver Glasner’s team successfully shut Haaland out as they beat City in the FA Cup Final back in May, albeit the striker turned down an opportunity to take a penalty.
Having grabbed the ball to score from the spot against Real in midweek, the 25-year-old will surely step up if he gets the chance at Selhurst Park. That ties in with the work he has done since the summer to improve his overall game and the possibilities to score as many goals as possible.
Kolo Toure, who played alongside Thierry Henry, Sergio Aguero and Luis Suarez in his career, has been giving Haaland tips this season in his role as part of Pep Guardiola’s backroom staff and letting him know exactly what centre-backs do not like when they play against a top forward. The former defender has been impressed as much by Haaland’s behaviour and body language as he has the performances.
“I always say to him, every time I had to play against a top striker it was always hard to sleep at night. I say to Erling, every time you play a team there’s a lot of them not sleeping at the moment because it’s always hard to play against a top striker,” he said.
“Obviously he’s right among the top – Thierry Henry, Alan Shearer. What I really like with Erling is he’s a humble guy. He’s an incredible person.
“He still has big room for improvement and he’s open to listening to advice. He’s so humble for what he’s achieved already. He scares me because when you have a top player like that normally the head can grow very big very quickly but Erling is down to earth – this is incredible. I think in the future he will be even better because he’s a top player but he’s a top human as well.”
Haaland has propelled City in the Premier League and Champions League this season but there have also been recent signs of the team becoming less reliant on him. He has just one of their last 12 league goals and full-back Nico O’Reilly was named man-of-the-match in Madrid for a big win for the Blues in midweek.
“When you look at the games like Real Madrid, you could see the moment that none of the team had control but we could keep fighting ,winning 50-50s and that is something which Man City have a lot,” said Toure. “The team always had a big control of the ball all the time but this is something you have to do.
“There are moments in the game where it is intense against a team who has quality – you need to be able to fight as well. We still have the base of Man City, which is a precision team game. Our players deserved the win and it gives you some trust and belief that you can go anywhere and win.”
