Erling Haaland shows ‘one of the worst things I’ve seen’ as Arsenal star catches strays with Man City player 2/10

Erling Haaland’s performance for Norway in the Nations League draw with Kazakhstan has been labelled “one of the worst things I’ve seen” by one of the country’s former managers.

Haaland Arsenal captain Martin Odegaard joined him in the Norway squad that failed to find a way in Kazakhstan, the latest disappointment after their failure to qualify for Euro 2024.

The Manchester City striker’s performance drew particular criticism from Norwegian broadcaster TV2, who gave him a 2/10 rating, describing the team’s overall performance as “deplorable”.

Former Norway manager Egil Olsen claimed he had never seen Haaland play so poorly and also criticised Odegaard for his inconsistent performance.

“We have two world-class players in the team,” Olsen said. “Today, Erling Braut Haaland was unfortunately far from being up to par. It’s one of the worst things I’ve seen from Haaland.

“Martin Odegaard shines sometimes, but I’ve seen him better too. A point here is a shame. No other team in this group will concede points to Kazakhstan.

Current Norway coach Stale Solbakken expressed confidence that Norway would bounce back when he spoke to reporters after the match.

“We have a lot of confidence in what we are doing and we are quite relaxed,” he said. “We have to be careful now that we don’t get crushed at the end. But clearly we came here with the hope and the prospect of taking the three points, and we should have achieved that.”

Odegaard also spoke to the media: “It’s a disappointment, we’re doing a lot of good things but we’re not scoring either. It’s difficult, nobody has good answers on the exact reasons why we’re not scoring.”

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Haaland has a very good international record to match his extraordinary club exploits, scoring 31 goals in 34 appearances for his country, all but five of those goals coming in competitive matches.

The disappointing performance for his country comes amid speculation he could be offered a new contract by Manchester City.

Haaland’s basic salary currently stands at £375,000-a-week, which already places him among the club’s top earners, although the structure of his contract includes a series of performance-related bonuses, which could potentially take his weekly earnings beyond £850,000.

It is unclear from a report in Spain whether those bonuses would remain in a new deal, but it has been claimed his starting salary would increase to close to £400,000-a-week.

The 24-year-old has scored 97 goals in 102 appearances for City, including seven in his first three games this season, and inspired the club to a historic treble in his debut campaign before lifting another Premier League trophy last term.