Alan Shearer has backed Erling Haaland to take the Premier League by storm and fire Manchester City to a third consecutive title.
City have won back-to-back Premier League titles playing largely without an out-and-out striker, but this summer Pep Guardiola and the club decided it was time to freshen up the squad. Among City's new recruits is Erling Haaland, the 22-year-old striker who has been sending shockwaves around Europe with his goal-scoring exploits since he joined Borussia Dortmund in 2020.
City paid £51m to bring Haaland to the Etihad, and will be hoping that he can help them maintain their hold on the Premier League and push on to win an elusive first Champions League title. City have pretty good pedigree when it comes to strikers; Sergio Aguero scored 260 goals in 360 appearances in all competitions for the Blues, and is the club's all-time leading goal-scorer.
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However, in his BBC Sport predictions column, the Premier League's all-time record goal-scorer Shearer said he thinks Haaland could go on to set his own records, as well as proving the difference in the title race.
"If I had to choose a [Premier League] winner now, it would be City — just about — because of Erling Haaland," Shearer said.
"They won the title without him last year, and without using a real centre-forward. Now they have got one who could and should score a minimum of 30 goals this season."
Should Haaland hit those kind of numbers, then he could break at least one record.
The 26 goals Sergio Aguero scored in 2014/15 is the record for the most goals scored by a City player in a single Premier League season.
Liverpool's Mohamed Salah holds the record for the most goals scored by a player in a single 38-game Premier League season, his tally of 32 in 2017/18 falling just shy of the 34 goals notched by Andrew Cole and Alan Shearer in 1993/94 and 1994/95 respectively (although those were both 42-game seasons).
Milestones aside, Shearer believes that Haaland will have no issues finding the back of the net for his new team, although there may be a bit of adaptation required on both sides.
"He is going to get many, many more chances for City because of the quality of their players and the service they will give him," he added.
"Yes, City might have to play slightly differently with him in their team, or he might have to adapt to the way they play, but that's not a problem either way. I actually think we will see a bit of both happening."
Haaland will get his first taste of Premier League action when City kick-off the new campaign with a visit to West Ham on Sunday.
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