Haaland starting to deserve Messi comparisons – Pep Guardiola

Manchester United’s boss Pep Guardiola believes his talismanic striker Erling Haaland is starting to deserve Lionel Messi’s comparisons. The young Norwegian has had a ridiculous season for the Cityzens as he has been playing in the beast mode.

Haaland reached 50 goals in all competitions for City with a penalty against Fulham on Sunday. This was Haaland’s 34th goal of the season in the Premier League, matching the previous record of Alan Shearer and Andrew Cole.

However, the Spaniard feels comparing Haaland with Messi will not help the former.

“No one can compare with Messi, it will not help Erling, but in terms of goals and mentality, yeah,” Guardiola, who coached Messi for four years while at Barcelona, told a news conference on Tuesday.

“Messi has done it every season in the last 10 or 15 seasons, but Erling has got to the same level in terms of goals. It’s almost every game, he scores a goal.

“One or two every game, he had the chances to do it but Messi is the most complete player I have seen in terms of vision, dribbles, passes, competitiveness, in many things that are difficult.

“Hopefully Erling can be so close like [to] Leo, that will be great for us and him.”

Pep feels Haaland will come under the scanner if he doesn’t match the same level with which he is currently playing but the youngster can always improve his game.

“Always, I’ve said with Erling it will be tough when you look at what he has done and if he doesn’t score the goals like he’s scoring now people will say ‘Oh, he’s in a bad situation’ but his game can improve a lot,” added the City manager.

“We have spoken about that. The movements, I wouldn’t say in the box but the game itself. I think he has that feeling ‘is that enough?’ I think he has the desire to get better as a player, as long as he has it he can do it. To go to work knowing you can do something better is the way.

“I know him a bit and he is so competitive and positive in his mindset. He has this incredible self-positive confidence in himself. It’s not arrogance. It’s self-confidence to say I am going to score.

“To arrive in his first season and score 50 already and he equalled the record for two legends in Andy Cole and Alan Shearer, so that’s big.”

Manchester City will take on West Ham on Wednesday night at the Etihad Stadium.