Former Manchester City defender Nedum Onuoha believes Erling Haaland will have a huge impact on the Blues in more ways than one, insisting his arrival in the Premier League is comparable to Cristiano Ronaldo's return to Manchester United last summer.
City, last week, announced that they had reached an agreement with Dortmund to lure Haaland to the Etihad Stadium this forthcoming summer, subject to him agreeing personal terms. They are understood to have agreed a fee of £51million with the German giants.
Haaland, who played his final game for Dortmund on Saturday, netting a penalty against Hertha Berlin, is considered as one of the brightest and most exciting talents in the world. He has gone from strength-to-strength in the last couple of years, highlighted by his tally of 86 goals in 89 appearances for the German heavyweights.
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Unsurprisingly, Haaland's impending arrival at the Etihad Stadium has been met with a wave of excitement, with him being tipped to take the Premier League by storm. And for former City man Onuoha, who played for the club between 2004 and 2012, Haaland's arrival in England has the potential to attract as much interest as Ronaldo's return almost 12 months ago.
"Seeing him come to the Premier League, one of the best young talents in the world, I think it's a big boost for the Premier League itself in the same way that it was a big boost for the Premier League to see [Cristiano] Ronaldo come back (to Manchester United) at the start of this season," Onuoha told Sports Mole.
"These are players who bring eyes and it's not just necessarily for the teams they play for, it's because that's who they are. For City to be able to bring in somebody of that age, there's scope for him to be there for a long time because he's still so young.
"A 21-year-old coming to the Premier League with this sort of noise around him is truly remarkable."
Haaland, of course, is going to be expected to score goals at a rapid rate of knots for City, and that is the exact reason why they are set to invest more than £50million in his signature. But Onuoha believes he will bring more than just goals to the Etihad Stadium.
Onuoha added: "I think he's going to be bringing the goals, because he'll get a ton of chances, that's a fact according to what we've seen from City over the past couple of years. But then also, I think he's a player that wants to get better and he has ambitions of being in the conversation for the Ballon d'Or and awards like that.
"I think he'll bring a few more bums on seats. I think he'll bring a lot more eyes.
"But all that stuff will bring more criticism as well. There will be lots of people who will only judge him as being a success if City win the Champions League, and even if he has a bad Champions League spell and they still win it, then they'll say 'well it was worth the money'.
"That's the situation they're caught in at the minute."
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