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The fastest players to reach 50 goals in the Premier League: Haaland obliterates record…

Nestor Watach •

With his goal against Liverpool, Manchester City striker Erling Haaland has smashed the record of scoring 50 Premier League goals in the fewest games.

The Norwegian scored 36 goals in his debut Premier League campaign with Manchester City, breaking the single-season record. He hasn’t let up since then, having notched 14 league goals in his first 13 appearances of 2023-24.

We’ve taken a closer look at some of the legendary Premier League strikers that can’t hold a candle to that.

10. Kevin Phillips – 83 games

Niall Quinn and Kevin Phillips were unstoppable in the 1998-99 First Division campaign, scoring a combined 46 goals to launch Sunderland to the Premier League.

Phillips took things up a level in their first season back up, collecting the European Golden Boot by scoring 30 goals in 36 games.

“I thought it was a hell of an achievement. No disrespect, but generally when players score 30 goals, they are doing it in a team who are in the top two, three, or four in the league,” Phillips reminisced years later.

“I did it in a team that finished seventh, in a team that – and I love Sunderland, they’re dear to my heart – are not fashionable compared to Man United, Arsenal, Liverpool and so on.”

Things slowed down considerably from that magical season; he scored 31 goals in the following three years combined, while his 50th goal eventually arrived in his 83rd appearance.

READ: Kevin Phillips: No English striker will match my European Golden Boot

9. Thierry Henry – 83 games

Many people’s pick as the all-time greatest Premier League player, Henry was good – great, even – in his early years, but he seemed to get better as time went on and peaked years after his arrival.

The legendary French forward scored his first Premier League hat-trick in his 50th appearance in the competition, against Leicester City on Boxing Day 2000. Henry scored 17 league goals in his first two seasons at Highbury and eventually notched his 50th goal midway through his third year in England, 2001-02, in his 83rd appearance.

8. Sergio Aguero – 81 games

It wouldn’t be Premier League goalscorers list without Aguero featuring somewhere.

The Argentinian scored his 50th league goal for Man City in a 5-1 thrashing away to Tottenham in January 2014. By that point he’d already scored arguably the most iconic goal in Premier League history – the title-clincher against QPR in 2012 – long since securing his legendary status.

Haaland might’ve got off to a faster start but he’ll have to hang around for many more years if he’s to surpass Aguero’s total tally of 184 Premier League goals.

7. Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang – 79 games

The Gabonese striker endured an inauspicious Arsenal exit after falling out with Mikel Arteta, while his Premier League return to Chelsea was as miserable as it was forgettable.

So it’s all too easy to forget that Aubameyang was a force to be reckoned with in his first few years in North London.

Some Bundesliga goalscorers struggle to adapt to the English game, but Aubameyang can be filed alongside Haaland as being every bit as prolific It’s especially impressive that the striker was so lethal for an otherwise ordinary Arsenal team, having been signed six months before Arsene Wenger’s departure in 2018.

It took Aubameyang just 79 games to score his 50th league goal for the Gunners.

=6. Mohamed Salah – 72 games

No player in English football has scored more goals than Salah since he arrived from Roma in 2017.

Liverpool’s Egyptian King only needed 59 games to score his 50th league goal for the club. Which stood as the record for a single club (until Haaland). And only Alan Shearer reached the milestone in fewer minutes played.

But prior to arriving in Merseyside, Salah had already made 13 Premier League appearances on the periphery at Chelsea, for whom he scored two goals.

=6. Fernando Torres – 72 games

Until Salah’s signing, Torres stood as the benchmark for great Premier League goalscorers at Liverpool.

El Nino arrived from Atletico Madrid with plenty of hype, and he somehow lived up to it in those scintillating early years at Anfield. He scored his 50th Premier League goal for the Reds in his 72nd appearance, a late match-winner in a 1-0 victory away to Aston Villa in December 2009.

We still can’t wrap our head around him making more appearances for Chelsea than Liverpool.

4. Ruud van Nistelrooy – 68 games

Surprisingly enough, Van Nistelrooy’s time at Old Trafford wasn’t a period of great success. The Dutchman only won the Premier League title once in five years, while the club won four in five before and after his time there.

Yet as the spearhead of that comparatively underperforming United team, Van Nistelrooy was unstoppable. He scored his 50th goal in his 68th appearance; the equaliser in a 2-1 win away to Newcastle, and the tenth successive game that he’d scored in.

3. Alan Shearer – 66 games

Obviously the Premier League’s all-time top goalscorer features near the top of the list.

Shearer was just approaching the peak of his powers when the Premier League was rebranded in 1992. He’d already played over 100 games for Southampton and scored 23 top-flight goals, earning a British transfer record move to newly-promoted and wildly ambitious Blackburn Rovers.

He set the tone for his legendary Premier League career with a brilliant brace on his debut for Blackburn and never looked back, needing just 66 games to score 50 goals.

Not bad going, especially considering that period included a long spell out on the sidelines with an ACL injury.

Alan Shearer turning out for Blackburn Rovers during the inaugural 1992-93 Premier League season, Ewood Park, Blackburn, 1992

READ: Recalling Shearer’s iconic Premier League debut and two forgotten thunderb*stards

2. Andrew Cole – 65 games

Cole was immense for Manchester United, a star of the legendary treble-winning side of ’99 and a five-time title-winner.

But he was never better than when he first made a name for himself with 34 league goals for Newcastle United in 1993-94, their first season back up in the Premier League.

Midway through his second season, he moved to Manchester United for a British record £7million fee and promptly reached the 50-goal milestone – with his unforgettable five-goal haul in the legendary 9-0 victory over Ipswich Town in March 1995.

1. Erling Haaland – 48 games

Haaland isn’t just ridiculous in a Premier League context, he’s ridiculous in a European context too.

Fifty Premier League goals in just 48 games. Bloke’s a machine.

READ NEXT: The fastest players to reach 50 goals in Europe’s big leagues since 2000

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