Haaland’s Scoring Streak Rewrites the Record Books”

ManCity striker cites becoming a dad as a reason for his blistering early-season stats

Football writer Dan Edwards analyses Erling Haaland's incredible start to the season which continued as Manchester City beat Brentford on Sunday.

Erling Haaland was the match-winner once again as Manchester City ground out a narrow 1-0 victory away to Brentford, to capitalize on a second successive defeat for Liverpool in the Premier League.

It was Man City’s 250th win in the Premier League under Pep Guardiola, making him only the fourth manager to reach that tally, after Sir Alex Ferguson, Arsene Wenger and David Moyes. He's the fastest in that quartet to hit the landmark, doing so in his 349th match in the competition.

It took only nine minutes for Haaland to score with his only shot of the game, utilising a deadly mixture of strength and composure after he was picked out by Josko Gvardiol for the second match running.

Haaland has taken his tally to nine goals for the season in the Premier League, going three clear of AFC Bournemouth's Antoine Semenyo as he hunts down his third Golden Boot.

The Norwegian had never previously scored at Brentford’s Gtech Community Stadium, but his strike means he has now found the net at 22 of the 23 stadia he has played at in the Premier League, the highest percentage of any player in the competition’s history.

The only stadium missing off his list is Anfield, where he is yet to score in three appearances in league action.

He will have the opportunity to right that wrong when Man City travel to Liverpool in February.

"I have never felt better than I do now," Haaland told Sky Sports after the win.

When asked if he was in the best form of his life, his response was simply, "Yes, you can say that."

And the stats certainly agree.

Haaland has scored in nine consecutive matches for club and country, the longest scoring streak of his career.

His tally for the season so far now stands at 18 goals in all competitions for Man City and Norway; he has only failed to score in one of his 14 matches, in the home defeat to Tottenham Hotspur in August

Haaland's nine goals from the opening seven matches is the third-highest return in Premier League history.

Remarkably, he has only ever been battered by himself, netting 11 times in 2022/23 and 10 times in 2024/25 at this stage of the season.

Unsurprisingly, he also holds the record for the most goals scored after eight games — 14 in 2022/23 — and as well as he is playing, he is unlikely to match that after his next appearance.

Outscoring every player in the Premier League is something Haaland has become accustomed to, but extraordinarily, he is also comfortably outscoring entire squads.

Only seven Premier League teams have bettered his nine goals this season, and one of those is of course his own club, Man City.

Indeed, he has matched both Manchester United and Crystal Palace for goals this season, and he has done so without taking a penalty or being caught offside.

His scoring rate has seen him playfully referred to as a machine or even a robot by fans and media alike, but Haaland reminded onlookers that he is human after all, citing his first child as a reason for his current levels.

"It is about preparation, getting ready for the games. You can be physically ready, but you need to be mentally ready.

"With [having] a kid, it makes me even better because I disconnect more than ever," he added.

"I don't think about football at all. When you are young, you think of this and that, and maybe worry about things but when I get home, I relax even more. I think I need to give a shout-out to my son."

Injuries permitting, it’s hard to imagine Haaland not winning the Premier League Golden Boot award again this season. What may be more of a challenge is winning the European Golden Boot for a second time, to add to the one he received in 2022/23.

Currently, Haaland is only being outscored by Harry Kane among players in Europe’s top five divisions, while he is tied with Kylian Mbappe. It's worth noting, though, that he has outscored both of those rivals when penalties are excluded.