Former Manchester United striker and manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer made a cheeky jibe at Manchester City’s Erling Haaland over his collapsed transfer to Old Trafford.
Missed opportunity
Now at City and unquestionably one of the world’s finest strikers, Haaland may leave some at United regretting their failure to sign him before their cross-town rivals.
United missed not one, but at least two opportunities to snap him up.
Solskjaer and Haaland worked together at Molde, where the latter was slowly building his reputation as a player of enormous potential. He then moved to Salzburg before Borussia Dortmund. It’s in Germany that Haaland truly announced himself to the world, earning a £51.2m switch to City in 2022.
Three years ago, Solskjaer revealed that he called United six months before his appointment as caretaker boss and pleaded with them to sign Haaland from Molde.
Solskjaer revealed that Haaland would have only cost the Red Devils £4m at the time.
His advice fell on deaf ears.
United rivalled City for Haaland’s signature but Pep Guardiola’s side prevailed ahead of them, winning the race for the lethal talisman.
Solskjaer and Haaland had a sit-down with Norwegian news outlet TV2 and discussed the 25-year-old’s career path.
Cheeky jibe
The United legend praised Haaland for his positive career trajectory, but couldn’t resist teasing that he should have joined United at some point.
Haaland said, “So, I chose Dortmund, and it turned out to be very good, perfect, well, not perfect, but again, nothing is perfect, but it was very good.”
“I developed, they bet on me, and I got to play.”
Solskjaer added, “You’ve been good with those choices, and of course, for me, you’ve made some other choices than the ones I would have made.”
“At least that one choice I think should have been made differently!”
The pair shared a laugh together, but some United fans won’t be feeling quite so jovial.
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