A goalscoring machine with the flowing blonde locks of his Viking heritage, Erling Haaland likes to tell his rivals to 'stay humble'.
Now that he has completed a deal that will dwarf anything he has ever seen in British football, he may have to take the advice himself.
That's because the attention that comes with such a big contract will propel 24-year-old Haaland and his 21-year-old partner Isabel Haugseng Johansen into the Premier League of fame.
A source close to the couple said: “They are getting bigger than the Beckhams. They will be the richest and most famous couple in the world of football.”
Backed by petrodollars from Abu Dhabi, Manchester City have signed Haaland to a new £500,000-a-week contract for nine and a half years.
Before tax, that's £260 million before his lucrative endorsements and profit bonuses are included.
That's around £71,000 per day, almost £3,000 per hour and 83p per second.
The minimum wage for ordinary people will rise to £12.21 per hour in April. Haaland earns that in 15 seconds.
It takes Haaland six seconds to earn the cost of a pint and just under two and a half days to earn enough to afford a new Ferrari Portofino M Convertible.
City are understood to have postponed the deal until the start of the season, meaning Haaland will pocket £3.25m in wages owed since then.
Tellingly, the striker said yesterday: “Now I am City, whatever happens.”
The Manchester club are still awaiting sentencing after being charged with 115 breaches of Premier League financial rules.
Possible sanctions include points deductions or even relegation from England's top division.
'We are just like any couple'
It means Haaland could potentially head to Millwall's New Den or Oxford United's Kassam Stadium instead of Anfield or Old Trafford, with his deal running until 2034.
One fan tweeted: “By the time his contract is up I will have grandchildren and they will still be watching him improve his stats against Burnley!”
The deal comes after Haaland and the glamorous Isabel welcomed their first child shortly before Christmas.
Although the couple are said to be living quietly in their six-bed Cheshire mansion, they are happy to spend the wealth they have amassed.
The couple have had luxury holidays, including holidays in Marbella, where Haaland owns a £6million villa, and on a yacht in Capri, Italy.
He is pictured pairing a £300,000 watch with a Burberry pajama set. In 2023, he was caught using his mobile phone behind the wheel of his £300,000 Rolls Royce Cullinan SUV.
Just before Christmas, Isabel spent more than £6,000 at Selfridges. Her items included a £2,700 Gucci bag, a £1,670 backpack and a £950 Gucci hoodie during the online spree.
Details of Isabel's spending spree emerged after blundering Selfridges staff accidentally sent her receipt to another customer.
Isabel and Haaland first met when they both played in Byrne, Norway, at the local youth football academy.
Haaland seems to have retained at least some of the down-to-earth character of a small-town boy.
During his first few weeks at City he was spotted shopping at Sainsbury's. He later mocked those who expressed surprise at seeing him in a regular supermarket, tweeting: “At M&S. I bought a bag of Percy Pig. Don't tell anyone.”
Isabel said: “We just want to live our lives without too much fuss. At the end of the day, we are just like any other couple.”
Of course, not every other young couple starting a family will earn £260m over the next ten years.
A source said: “Isabel absolutely loves sport and football – that's how they met.
“She is amazingly fit and stunningly beautiful and the brands will be all over her – not just sports names, but beauty.”
Haaland signed off his monstrous new deal with an Instagram video for his 38.5 million followers.
Fans saw him in nothing but white shorts, sitting cross-legged in the snow in a meditation position that he used in goal celebration.
Ethereal music plays before the star says, “I'm here to stay.”
One fan wrote: “My day has been made! Thank you Erling.”
Another said: “Stay humble.”
It is a reference to Haaland's 'stay humble' advice to Arsenal boss Mikel Arteta after City's 98th-minute equalizer against the London club in late September.
Let's be clear. The reason Haaland is paid this obscene amount of money is because he is worth it.
He is arguably the greatest striker in the best league in the world and his goalscoring record at City is astonishing.
He is one of the reasons why the Premier League is being sold around the world – from Laos to Uzbekistan and the Pacific Islands – for £10.4 billion in TV rights.
Arriving at City from Borussia Dortmund in 2022 for £51.2m, he scored 52 goals in all competitions, including a season-record 36 in the Premier League.
That season the team won the league, the FA Cup and the Champions League to clinch the Treble.
Last season he scored 38 goals in 45 appearances and he has already scored 21 goals this term as he goes for his third consecutive Premier League Golden Boot win.
Haaland said yesterday: “For two and a half years as a City player I won a lot of trophies, played good football and had so many great moments together with the whole club and with the fans.”
The £260 million deal is a defining moment for a sport that has deep roots in the working-class communities of 19th-century Lancashire mill towns.
Players who chose Accrington and Preston North End when the Football League began in 1888 would hardly believe that wealth now permeates the game.
When Everton signed Nick Ross from Preston that year, he was paid £10 a month. Haaland will earn that in about 12 seconds. By the late 1960s, players were still earning relatively little despite drawing huge crowds.
When City club legend Mike Summerbee signed for Swindon Town in 1965, his wages rose from £35 to £40 a week.
Still, Haaland's salary is relatively paltry compared to that of the top earners in global sport.
Los Angeles Dodgers baseball star Shohei Ohtani earns £57.4 million a year over a 10-year contract.
Juan Soto of the New York Mets raises £41.8 million over fifteen years, totaling £627 million.
And Mexican boxer Canelo Alvarez has a £60m-a-year contract with broadcaster DAZN for five years, while Formula 1's Max Verstappen will earn £45m a year over six years with his Red Bull team.
With skin like white marble and shoulder-length blond hair, Haaland is the archetypal Northman.
Yet he was born on July 21, 2000, in Yorkshire, where his father – Norwegian international Alfie Haaland – played for Leeds United.
By the mid-1990s, Alfie was married to Gry Marita Braut – a Norwegian heptathlete – and had children Astor, a finance student, Gabrielle, a healthcare assistant and Instagram personality, and finally Erling.
Erling's birth in Yorkshire made him eligible for the English Three Lions.
In 2000, Alfie signed for Manchester City, where he would stay for three years.
A simmering feud with hard-hitting midfielder Roy Keane would come to a head in April 2001 when the Manchester United star brutally raked his studs into Haaland senior's leg.
The United man was sent off for the tackle, in revenge for Alfie who accused him of faking an injury – which was in fact career-threatening – more than three years earlier.
Keane would later write in his autobiography: “I hit him bloody hard. The ball was there (I think). Take that.'
The bad blood lingers.
United fans goad Erling with chants of “Keano” – and Keane has not spared his criticism.
The pundit told Sky Sports: “In front of goal he is the best in the world but his overall game for such a player is so poor. He's almost a League Two player.”
'I am very happy, proud'
Alfie was said to be “really devastated” by the comment.
When Alfie's Premier League career ended in 2003, the family returned to his hometown of Bryne in Norway.
Young Erling loved running and was a natural athlete. At the age of five, he is said to have broken the world record for the long jump with a jump of 1.63 meters.
With ten members of his extended family being professional footballers, he was drawn to the game and proved to be a natural talent.
While attending Byrne's football academy at the age of five, Haaland met Isabel, another football-mad youngster.
The new mother once said: 'We were just children, kicking a ball without a care in the world.
“We were inseparable on the field. We didn't know it at the time, but those moments were the foundation of something much bigger.”
In 2016, he and two friends from the Norwegian youth team released their own hip-hop song on YouTube under the name Flow Kingz.
Haaland calls himself “Lyng” and raps in a baseball cap and hoodie while pretending to flip burgers and bounce on a trampoline.
His lyrics include: “I look good even when I eat”.
It's a good thing his football career took off.
The club signed for Molde in 2017 and put the 6ft tall lanky youth on a high protein diet – including reindeer steaks – to bulk him up.
After moves to Red Bull Salzburg and Dortmund, he arrived in Manchester.
Yesterday Haaland said: “I'm super happy, proud.
“I look forward to staying here for a long time.”
The next decade will surely bring him untold wealth and, just maybe, a spell playing championship football.
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