Read 4 minutesUpdated: 6 July 2026 12:31 PM IST
Norway stunned five-time champions Brazil 2-1 at the New Jersey Stadium in New York, USA on Sunday. Erling Haaland’s brilliant brace sealed victory for the Scandinavian nation, with substitute midfielder Andreas Schjeldrup assisting both goals.
Neymar’s late penalty did not save Brazil from a comeback as Haaland’s brace sealed Norway’s place in the quarter-finals, where they will face England.
The Manchester City striker has quickly emerged as one of the most naturally gifted goalscorers of his generation with sharp instincts and movement.
He may not have the ability to link play, or he may not yet be the best producer on the pitch, but in the box, the ball slams into the back of the net with greater frequency than he does at the first opportunity.
“He’s got something that maybe you can’t coach that much — the sniff for a goal, the feeling that the ball will land at your feet or that movement, and I think that’s his biggest strength,” Norway head coach Stel Solbacken said after the Round of 32 win over Cote d’Ivoire.
Also read | The Making of Haaland: How a Little Boy Became Football’s Ultimate Predator
His rich run of form continued after Sunday’s goal in New Jersey, as he joins Argentina’s Lionel Messi and France’s Kylian Mbappe at the top of the race for the Golden Boot at this World Cup with seven goals in four games. His recent strike has now seen him score in each of his last 14 competitive internationals for Norway.
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It was the Norwegian’s third multi-goal game at this World Cup, making him the third highest scorer in a single edition. Only two players had more in a single edition: Just Fontaine (4 in 1958) and Sander Kossis (4 in 1954).
Haaland is only the second player to score in the first four matches of his World Cup debut, with Peruvian Teofilo Cubillas the second player to do so in the 1970 World Cup.
Haaland’s 7 goals on his World Cup debut is the most since Poland’s Grzegorz Lato in 1974 (7). He now has more goals in his WC debut (7) than Kylian Mbappe (4), Lionel Messi (1) and Cristiano Ronaldo (1) combined in their debut tournament (6).
The Manchester City star is the first Norwegian player to score two goals in a knockout match at a major international tournament, while Haaland has all three examples of a Norwegian player scoring 2+ goals in a major tournament match in any round at the 2026 World Cup (including braces against Brazil, Iraq and Senegal).
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Haaland is averaging one goal in every 14 touches he has had in this tournament, the lowest number of players to score 3 or more goals in a single edition of the World Cup in the last 60 years.
The Solbakken side have not won a game in almost three years without Haaland getting on the scoresheet. The most recent such match was a 2–0 win against the Faroe Islands in November 2023, and on that eve, Haaland came on as a second-half substitute.
Norway face England in their quarter-final on Sunday, July 12, with Solbakken hoping his star forward can once again be the difference for the Scandinavians.
Written by Madhav Sachdeva, intern at Online Sports Desk