Haaland eyes Dixie Dean’s 95-year-old record

Haaland (Photo by Thomas COEX / AFP)

You name it and Erling Haaland has probably been called it as his prolific debut season in English football continues to destroy Premier League goalscoring records.

Any questions about how the Norway striker would fit in Manchester City’s system this season were soon answered when he netted 14 goals in his first eight Premier League games, including back-to-back hat-tricks against Crystal Palace and Nottingham Forest.

With 25 goals in his first 19 league games, it seems a matter of when, not if, Haaland will break Andy Cole and Alan Shearer’s Premier League record of 34 goals in one season.

William Ralph Dean led Everton to the league title in 1927-28. Known as Dixie, Dean scored a barely believable 60 league goals, even though he missed three of the 42 matches that season.

Many years after his famous season, Dean spoke about his record. “People ask me if that 60-goal record will ever be beaten,” he said. “I think it will. But there’s only one man who’ll do it. That’s that fella who walks on the water. I think he’s about the only one.”

Blackburn Rovers’ Ted Harper scored a record 43 goals during the 1925-26 top-flight campaign, but his impressive mark stood for just two years before Dean blew it out of the water.

Former Liverpool manager Bill Shankly recalled Dean as well as anyone, having played against him for Preston North End in the mid-1930s.

“Dixie was the greatest centre-forward there will ever be,” he said. “His record of goalscoring is the most amazing thing under the sun. He belongs in the company of the supremely great like Beethoven, Shakespeare and Rembrandt.”

So how good was Dean? It is difficult to compare across eras, however it is easier to compare Dean with his peers. Looking