{"id":3773,"date":"2026-06-17T14:51:21","date_gmt":"2026-06-17T14:51:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/?p=3773"},"modified":"2026-06-17T14:51:21","modified_gmt":"2026-06-17T14:51:21","slug":"world-cup-2026-haaland-rises-to-the-occasion-on-world-cup-debut","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/?p=3773","title":{"rendered":"World Cup 2026: Haaland rises to the occasion on World Cup debut"},"content":{"rendered":"


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If there is a stage that is too big for Erling Haaland, we’re yet to find it.<\/b><\/p>\n

A hat-trick on his Champions League debut for Red Bull Salzburg, a hat-trick on his Bundesliga debut for Borussia Dortmund, a double on his Premier League debut for Manchester City, and now two goals on his World Cup finals debut, inspiring Norway to a 4-1 win over Iraq.<\/a><\/p>\n

The 2026 World Cup might be six days in, but it felt as if it really began on Tuesday, with Kylian Mbappe inspiring France to a 3-1 victory over Senegal with two superb goals which made him Les Bleus’ all-time leading scorer.<\/p>\n

Little over an hour later, Haaland strode out for his first World Cup appearance and picked up the gauntlet thrown by Mbappe, nearly 18 months his senior, with a display full of desire, as well as the goals we have come to expect.<\/p>\n

Norway manager Stale Solbakken said afterwards: “You can see he lived up to the occasion – it wasn’t too big for him.<\/p>\n

“I had a good feeling before the game, the last training session was very good. I had a feeling he would do it for us today.”<\/p>\n

Iraq head coach Graham Arnold added: “He’s just an amazing number nine. We dealt with him quite well for a lot of the game (but) at the end of the day he’s a top striker.<\/p>\n

“Norway could shock a lot of people with the team they have. They could go a very long way.”<\/p>\n

Arnold spoke to Haaland after the final whistle and revealed: “I just said to him: ‘You’re one of the best number nines I’ve ever seen.’ He’s so strong, so quick and he’s just lethal.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If there is a stage that is too big for Erling Haaland, we’re yet to find it. A hat-trick on…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3774,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3773","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sport"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3773","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3773"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3773\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3774"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3773"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3773"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3773"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}