New Details Emerge on How Manchester United Painfully Missed out On Erling Haaland

New Details Emerge on How Manchester United Painfully Missed out On Erling Haaland

Rene Otinga
updated at April 12, 2023 at 8:11 PM
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  • Manchester United missed out on the chance to sign Erling Haaland when he was just a teenager
  • Ole Gunnar Solskjaer had identified the Norwegian’s ‘unreal’ talent and recommended him for United
  • But a move for his services never materialized, and he ended up moving to Borussia Dortmund in 2020

Haaland is currently the leading marksman in the Premier League, having secured a move to Manchester City in the summer.

Manchester United painfully missed out on the chance to sign a young Erling Haaland, despite getting the green light from Ole Gunnar Solskjaer.

The Mirror reports that a few years back, Solskjaer was smitten with Haaland’s talents, and he phoned the Man United bosses to possibly make a move for him.

Haaland, Molde
Erling Braut Haaland of Team Molde FK Photocall on February 21, 2017, in Molde, Norway. Photo by Trond Tandberg
Source: Getty Images

This was long before Manchester City showed interest in the Norwegian.

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United, however failed to act on the tip, and an insider within FC Molde has come out with interesting details of what went down.

“I remember one day when I was watching Erling train," Molde's chief scout told The Athletic.

"I walked down to see Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, who was Molde’s manager, and I said, ‘You have to call Manchester United, mate – this is unreal what we are looking at.’
“Me and Ole understood that this kid was so good we were not going to be able to keep him. Ole agreed with absolutely everything. ‘I will put a phone call in’, he said, ‘they need to hear about this kid’. We had friends at United.

At the time, Haaland had barely established himself at Molde properly and Solskjaer was quick to make the call to Manchester United.

“Then, how or whether United followed it up, I don’t know.” The scout went on.

In 2020, United finally expressed interest in signing Haaland, but they were beaten to his signature by Borussia Dortmund.

At the time, Haaland did an interview where he revealed Dortmund were more direct in their approach to signing him.

Ronaldo’s message to Man United teammates after Sheriff win

Elsewhere, Manchester United superstar Cristiano Ronaldo heaped praise on his teammates after breaking his goal-scoring duck for the season

First-half strikes from Jadon Sancho and Ronaldo ensured the Red Devils secured their first win in the Europa League, getting their campaign back on track after suffering a shock home defeat to Sociedad on match day one.

After helping his side to their first win in Europe's secondary club competition, an elated Ronaldo took to social media to express his appreciation for the effort of his teammates.

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Rene Otinga
Rene Otinga is a sports journalist with over eight years of working experience in digital media. Rene's experience includes working as a Copywriter at X News Kenya and TUKO.co.ke.
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Ole Gunnar Solskjaer