CNN
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Since joining Manchester City, Erling Haaland has broken record after record and set himself expectations that seem impossible to fulfil.

Yet somehow he has continued to break records this season, scoring nine goals in just four Premier League games – the most prolific start to a season ever, surpassing Wayne Rooney’s previous record of eight.

Haaland has been so dominant this season that his individual tally of nine goals is more than every Premier League team except his own Manchester City have scored combined. And on Saturday, only the width of a goalpost prevented the Norwegian star from scoring an unprecedented run of hat-tricks in three consecutive Premier League games.

He eventually scored twice to lead Manchester City to a 2–1 victory over Brentford, taking his own tally for the club to 99 in just 103 games.

His first came in the 19th minute, with City trailing after Brentford had scored after just 22 seconds. His second came just before half-time, when he outwitted the Bees defence, latched onto a long pass from goalkeeper Ederson and fired the ball into the net.

The performance came after Haaland was in doubt about whether he would participate in the match following the death of a close family friend earlier in the week.

Haaland is already the quickest player to reach 50 Premier League goals, in just 48 games – 17 faster than Andrew Cole’s previous record. Should he lead the league in goals again this season, he would become the first player since Thierry Henry in 2006 to win three consecutive Golden Boot awards.

“He’s got that all-round combination of: he’s very quick, he’s big, he’s strong. He’s very difficult to mark and he’s prolific,” Lineker, a prominent BBC broadcaster and host of the podcast “The Rest Is Football,” told CNN Sport last month.

“He doesn’t worry about missing, which is one of the keys to scoring. He misses chances, but to be a really good goalscorer you have to miss a lot of chances, because that means you get a lot of chances and score if you’re a good finisher, which he is.”