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Anyone who has followed soccer at all this year has probably heard of Norway’s bright young talent Erling Haaland. Haaland has been superb for RB Salzburg, both in the Austrian Bundesliga and on the world stage in the Champions League. Some of his remarkable stats include 7 goals scored in the Champions League and 5 total hat-tricks this season.
Salzburg's Erling Haaland scored his fifth hat-trick of the season today.
— B/R Football (@brfootball) November 10, 2019
The 19 year old has 26 goals in 18 games pic.twitter.com/5l3O4XzXgD
Kicker reports that, like many of Europe’s biggest clubs, Bayern Munich are also interested in signing this phenom. Some of Haaland’s other suitors include FC Barcelona, Juventus, Real Madrid and Manchester United. Julian Nagelsmann has also recently stated he wants Haaland to stay in the Red Bull family and move to RB Leipzig as well.
For Bayern Munich, Haaland could be an extremely important player for both the present and the future. Robert Lewandowski is currently occupying the striker spot better than anyone else in the world, but he has no backup for whenever he needs rest. When Bayern Munich decided to sit Lewandowski against VfL Bochum in the DFB Pokal, their attack was extremely poor without a natural center-forward to occupy the central defenders.
Bayern Munich will also want to invest in the unfortunately inevitable post-Lewandowski future. Nowadays players go well into their mid-30s and can still play at an extremely high level. Cristiano Ronaldo (34), Lionel Messi (32), and Franck Ribery (36) are just some examples so Lewandowski definitely still has some very productive years ahead. That being said, no player can go on forever, and Haaland can be the perfect player to take over the reigns from Lewandowski.
Haaland might be Lewandowski’s understudy similar to how Kingsley Coman was to Franck Ribery before taking over his role. Coman did not play much in his first few years but got to learn on both wings behind greats like Ribery and Arjen Robben before becoming a starter this year. Bayern Munich can do something similar with Haaland and play him in games when Lewandowski needs rest or is injured to get him some experience.
Right now, there is no indication in where Haaland may want to move. Bayern Munich has pursued the Norwegian striker in the past but could not entice him to join the Bayern youth system over Champions League play at RB Salzburg. Hopefully Bayern Munich will be more successful in their renewed pursuit of the striker this time.