Sports Mole takes a closer look at the fastest players to score 50 international goals after Norway’s Erling Haaland became the latest name to join an exclusive list.
It is fair to say that Erling Haaland loves scoring goals and has built his career on putting the ball into the back of the net in record-breaking fashion, both at club and international level.
Less than three months into the 2025-26 season and Manchester City’s Norwegian goal machine has already scored a staggering 21 goals in just 12 appearances for club and country.
Haaland is currently enjoying the best scoring streak of his professional career having found the net in each of his last 10 appearances across all competitions, scoring 10 goals in his last seven games for Man City and netting nine goals in his last three outings for Norway during this remarkable run.
The striker bagged yet another hat-trick – his sixth for Norway – in their comprehensive 5-0 home victory over Israel in 2026 World Cup qualifying on Saturday – and he could have scored four had he not missed from the penalty spot early in the first half.
“You think you’ve seen everything, but he just gets better and better,” Haaland’s Norwegian teammate Alexander Sorloth told reporters after the match: “There’s nothing he can’t do. His statistics are unbelievable.”
“There are no words to describe him,” Norway’s assistant coach Kent Bergersen added. “There are no words that can do him justice. He scores goals in every possible way.”
Acknowledging Haaland’s missed penalty, Norway head coach Stale Solbakken jokingly added: “I discovered that he’s from the same planet as the rest of us.”
Haaland joins exclusive group after reaching 50-goal mark for Norway
Haaland has now scored an impressive 51 goals in just 46 international appearances for Norway, becoming only the sixth men’s player in history to reach half a century of goals in fewer than 50 caps.
Norway’s leading marksman has achieved this milestone faster than a plethora of star names including Harry Kane (71 games), Neymar (74 games), Kylian Mbappe, Robert Lewandowski (both 90 games), Lionel Messi (107 games) and Cristiano Ronaldo (114 games).
Haaland is not the quickest in international history to reach 50 goals, though, as that record is held by a fellow Scandinavian Poul Nielsen, who needed just 36 games to reach the half-century mark for Denmark between 1910 and 1924.
Two of the greatest strikers of all time, West Germany’s Gerd Muller and Hungary’s Ferenc Puskas, rank joint-second on this list after scoring their first 50 international goals after 41 appearances.
Muller remarkably ended his career with more goals than games played (68 goals in 62 caps) and reached the 50-goal mark for West Germany in 1972.
Prior to that, Puskas – who has an award, a stadium and Hungarian football clubs named after him to recognise his legendary status – reached 50 international goals in 1952 and went on to score 84 goals in 85 games for his country.
Another Hungarian ahead of Haaland on this list is Sandor Kocsis, who netted 50 times in just 42 appearances, reaching the landmark in 1954. Like Muller, Kocsis ended his international career with more goals than games (75 goals in 68 caps).
Haaland can at least say that he notched up 50 international goals quicker than Brazilian icon Pele, who needed 49 games to reach the same landmark before finishing his career with a total of 77 goals in 92 matches for the South American giants.
What other international records could Haaland break?
Haaland’s primary focus will be on firing Norway to their first World Cup since 1998 and to their first major international tournament in 26 years, with the Scandinavians currently in pole position to finish top of Group I.
However, Haaland will have some more international goalscoring records to chase down in the near future, including one held jointly by Messi and Ronaldo.
Indeed, Haaland’s latest triple of goals against Israel represents his sixth hat-trick for Norway, which has put him four behind the record of 10 hat-tricks in men’s international football held by Argentina’s Messi and Portugal’s Ronaldo.
If he continues to score at his current rate on the international stage (1.09 goals per game), Haaland will back himself to break Ronaldo’s all-time international scoring record of 141 goals, which could yet increase as the 40-year-old is still going strong for Portugal.
Haaland is already the first European player to score five goals in a single World Cup qualifier and has netted the most goals in a single World Cup qualification campaign (12), but both of these record could be broken or extended in the near future – potentially as early as next month when Norway face Estonia and Italy.
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