Erling Haaland’s goalscoring run came to an end against Aston Villa but he’s still been incredible to start the new campaign.
The Villans managed to keep the Norwegian striker quiet in what was much more of an exception than a rule. He has already scored 15 goals in 12 games for Manchester City this season. For club and country, he’s found the net 23 times in just 14 matches across all competitions.
Last year, it took him 24 games to score 23 goals, which is already an amazing tally. To better that is truly unimaginable, or at least it should be. But he made it possible.
Still, football’s very much a team sport and Man City themselves have had a lot of influence in Haaland’s numbers. Both he and the Citizens have shown a lot of progress relative to last season.
How Haaland and Man City have been helping each other out this season
Overdependence
First of all, it may not be of Man City’s interest to have so much of the scoring burden on Erling Haaland’s shoulders alone.
They did manage to put three past Swansea this week in the Carabao Cup, but created no big chances and their best one was a Josko Gvardiol header worth 0.16 Expected Goals.
At least Omar Marmoush broke his scoring drought and found the net for the first time this season. The Egyptian hadn’t scored in nine games before that, with his last goal coming against Bournemouth in May.
Rayan Cherki is also slowly coming back from injury and trying to settle in. He could be a huge help in terms of creative passing, using skill to cause danger out of nowhere and long-range shots against low blocks.
Haaland has scored 65% of Man City’s Premier League goals in the current campaign – far and away the most by any player relative to his team (the closest is Nick Woltemade with 44% of Newcastle’s goals). That’s also well above the Norwegian’s previous tallies for the Citizens.
| Premier League season | Haaland goals | Man City goals | % of team goals |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025-26 | 11 | 17 | 64.7% |
| 2024-25 | 22 | 72 | 30.6% |
| 2023-24 | 27 | 96 | 28.1% |
| 2022-23 | 36 | 94 | 38.3% |
Pep Guardiola will hope that what happened against Swansea will continue even with the No.9 on the pitch, as his teammates take a step forward and start sharing the goalscoring duties.
The power of friendship
Haaland’s numbers have been crazy since he joined Borussia Dortmund and will probably stay that way for many years to come wherever he plays. His first season at Man City was nothing short of spectacular.
But he’s on pace to surpass that this year. And one particular part of his offensive output stands out – curiously, related not to himself but his teammates.
Erling Haaland is recording, by far, his highest percentages in assisted offensive actions/situations in 2025-26 than any other season for Man City.
| 2025-26 | 2024-25 | 2023-24 | 2022-23 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Assisted goals % | 93.3% | 64.7% | 71.1% | 65.4% |
| Assisted shots % | 85.7% | 76.7% | 81.0% | 77.3% |
| Assisted big chances % | 90.9% | 73.2% | 76.0% | 72.4% |
| Assisted xG % | 88.7% | 65.4% | 70.6% | 65.4% |
At the same time, 2024-25 was the season in which recorded the most of a few unassisted actions and situations. That’s not to say he was creating everything for himself in difficult contexts, dribbling past defenders and taking matters by his own hands.
There are always chances that the opposing defence deflected or gave it to him themselves through individual errors. So there can be unassisted attempts that are as easy – or sometimes even easier – than assisted ones.
It’s important to establish that he did drop a level and underperformed relative to what he had already shown he was capable of. But having chances handed to you by teammates, looking to set you up in the best possible way certainly helps.
More dangerous opportunities
Not only is the No.9 getting more help from teammates relative to his offensive actions, but also receiving better service overall.
The sudden drop in big chances per game last season also tells part of the story as to why his performances took such a hit.
Now, he’s taken a step further averaging the most big chances per 90 minutes than any other season for Man City.
His tally of xG per shot taken was closer than it was in his first year at the Etihad before facing Aston Villa, and has now dropped following attempts worth 0.16, 0.05 and 0.02 xG.
Haaland’s actually having his season with the fewest touches in the opposition box for Manchester City this year. But it’s also his campaign with the fewest touches overall.
In terms of percentage of his touches that occur inside the box, 2025-26 ranks second out of his four for the Citizens.
| 2025-26 | 2024-25 | 2023-24 | 2022-23 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| xG per shot attempt | 0.22 | 0.23 | 0.22 | 0.24 |
| Big chances per 90 minutes | 1.9 | 1.6 | 1.8 | 1.9 |
| Touches in the opp box % | 29.1% | 31.9% | 28.5% | 26.5% |
Higher conversion rate
Now we’ve reached the individual part of the game, in which the Norwegian seems to have developed well between the end of last season and the start of the current one.
He’s back to overperforming his xG tally after two consecutive campaigns with negative returns.
In terms of big chance conversion, it’s as high as it’s been for him since joining the club in 2022. Bear in mind that he’s already managed to maintain over 50% in this category for much longer in his first season.
| 2025-26 | 2024-25 | 2023-24 | 2022-23 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Big chance conversion % | 54.5% | 42.3% | 36.0% | 51.7% |
| xG performance | +4.1 | -5.6 | -1.7 | +8.6 |
The only worrying sign is the drop from last season in his post-shot xG return. This issue even reared its ugly head in the Aston Villa game.
He’s actually lowered the probability of his shots becoming goals once the ball leaves his foot. The Norwegian has turned his 10.9 xG into 10.3 xGOT in 2025-26.
Statistically speaking, it doesn’t feel realistic to expect Haaland to maintain this rhythm for too long. So much so that his goalscoring run for club and country stopped at 12 games. And to be fair, the numbers are probably going to drop eventually – some of them have already gone down from last game.
But if the Citizens keep creating this many great (and sometimes ‘unmissable’) opportunities for him, there’s a chance the averages don’t take a significant hit and stay unbelievable. Just a little less than they are right now.