World Cup 2026: Haaland rises to the occasion on World Cup debut
If there’s a huge stage for Erling Haaland, we haven’t found it yet.
He scored a hat-trick on his Champions League debut for RB Salzburg, a hat-trick on his Bundesliga debut for Dortmund, a double on his Premier League debut for Manchester City and now he scored twice on his World Cup final debut to inspire Norway to a 4-1 win over Iraq.
The 2026 World Cup may be six days away, but it actually felt like it had started on Tuesday, with Kylian Mbappe leading France to a 3-1 victory over Senegal and becoming Les Bleus’ all-time top scorer with two stunning goals.
Just over an hour later, Haaland made his World Cup debut and took the glove from Mbappe, who is nearly 18 months his senior, in a display of desire and the goals we expected.
Norwegian coach Stale Solbakken said afterwards: “You can see he adapted to the situation, it wasn’t a big deal for him.
“I had a good feeling before the game, the last training session was very good. I felt like he was going to do that for us today.”
Iraq head coach Graham Arnold added: “He’s a fantastic number nine. We got on pretty well with him for most of the game. [but] At the end of the day, he is a top-level striker.
“Norway can shock a lot of people with the team they have. It can go a very long way.”
Arnold spoke to Haaland after the final whistle and said: “I just said to him: ‘You’re one of the best number nines I’ve ever seen.’ “He’s very strong, very fast and lethal.”
