This is why Manchester City signed Erling Haaland; not to break Premier League scoring records at a canter, but to get the Citizens over the line on mammoth European nights.

Pep Guardiola’s yet to achieve his ultimate aim in Manchester thanks to a combination of overthinking, Anfield, and misfortune. For all their domestic success under the Spaniard, you feel that his job at the Etihad won’t be complete until he guides City to their first Champions League crown.

Once again, Guardiola’s side have waltzed into the quarter-finals of the competition, but this is where things start to get weird for the Premier League’s dominant force. Before reaching the final in 2021, City suffered three successive quarter-final exits to inferior opposition.

Such inferiority will likely not be manifested by Thomas Tuchel’s Bayern Munich over the upcoming two legs. It’s a belter of a tie, and City will be leaning on the goalscoring prowess of their Norwegian menace against the Bavarian behemoth.

Haaland’s stint in the Bundesliga means he’s faced up against Bayern on several occasions, and here’s what his scoring record against Die Roten looks like.

Haaland has faced Bayern seven times in his career thus far, all during his spell with Borussia Dortmund. Despite his prolific presence, BVB’s distinct inferiority complex continued to manifest in Der Klassiker.

Thus, Haaland lost all seven meetings against Bayern – five in the Bundesliga, and two in the DFL-Supercup. However, the striker fared pretty well from a scoring perspective. In these seven games, Haaland scored five times.

His most memorable outing came in March 2021 when he scored twice in the opening ten minutes of a Bundesliga encounter before Bayern scored four unanswered to win 4-2 thanks to a pair of strikes at the death.

The Norwegian’s first goal at the Allianz Arena arrived earlier in the 2020 DFL-Supercup. Haaland scored Dortmund’s second on the night as they equalised from 2-0 down before Joshua Kimmich struck late on to hand Bayern the trophy.

Record vs

Played

Won

Drawn

Lost

Goals scored

Bayern Munich

7

0

0

7

5

Haaland heads into the first leg against Bayern as the leading goalscorer in this season’s Champions League. He’s scored ten times, with Joao Mario and Vinicius Jr’s tallies of six the next best among players still left in the competition.

The 22-year-old made a name for himself under the bright continental lights at Red Bull Salzburg, and after he netted five against RB Leipzig in City’s round of 16 second leg, he took his tally in the Champions League up to 33 goals. He’s already the joint-19th leading scorer in the competition and has bagged more than the likes of Samuel Eto’o, Antoine Griezmann, Kaká and Wayne Rooney.

Haaland has seemingly dominated every opponent he’s faced in the Champions League, and the table below shows all the clubs he’s scored three or more goals against in the competition.

Opponent

Played

Goals scored

Sevilla

3

6

RB Leipzig

2

5

Genk

2

4

Club Brugge

2

4

Besiktas

2

3

Napoli

2

3

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Credit: 90min.com

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