Manchester City vs RB Leipzig Football Match Report – Mar 14, 2023

Erling Haaland made history with five goals, including a first-half hat-trick, and emphatically propelled Manchester City into the quarters with an 8-1 aggregate win with a 7-0 win over RB Leipzig at the Etihad Stadium on Tuesday.

Haaland was at his superhuman best as he became the only player alongside Lionel Messi to score five goals in a Champions League knockout game and became one of only three players (along with Luiz Adriano) to score five goals in a Champions League game .

His record success also gave the Norwegian goalscorer 39 goals a season, breaking City’s single-season goalscoring record previously set by Tommy Johnson in 1928–29.

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“It’s a great night. Firstly, I’m proud to play in this competition, I love it. Five goals. Winning 7-0 is incredible,” he said.

“My super strength is scoring goals. Should I be honest? A lot of goals today, I didn’t think so. I was just trying to put them in the back of the net,” he added. “A lot of that is being quick in the mind and trying to put it where the goalkeeper isn’t.”

The round of 16 was level after a 1-1 draw in Germany but the Premier League champions, led by Haaland, made easy work of Leipzig in Manchester to reach the quarter-finals for a sixth consecutive season.

After City were dominant in the early stages, Haaland put the hosts ahead in the 22nd minute when he converted a penalty after a controversial handball against Leipzig defender Benjamin Henrichs.

A little over a minute later and Leipzig, still affected by that penalty award, City took complete control.

Kevin De Bruyne, back in the starting line-up and back at his best after some pre-game pushes from Pep Guardiola, unleashed a sensational left-footed shot against the underside of the bar which Haaland followed to head into an unguarded net.

The goal made Haaland the youngest (22 years, 236 days) and fastest (25 games) to score 30 Champions League goals.

But the Norwegian was far from finished.

In the final action of the first half, Haaland showed his predatory instincts again as Leipzig’s Amadou Haidara cleared the ball off the line but straight to the City striker after Ruben Dias’ header hit the post.

The goal meant Haaland became the only player alongside Messi to score a first-half hat-trick in a Champions League knockout game and it was his first three-goal success in the competition since his FC Salzburg debut in the year 2019

But there was still a lot to happen in the second half.

Ilkay Gundogan briefly snatched the spotlight from his team-mate with a well-placed finish in the 49th minute after a clean exchange with Jack Grealish, but the Haaland show was only momentarily interrupted.

His fourth and fifth goals came in the 53rd and 57th minutes, both from close-range predatory finishes to complete his five-goal tally in 57 minutes. That’s faster than Messi (84′) and Luiz Adriano (82′) did the same.

And after suffering so many seasons in this competition, Haaland did everything to suggest he could make the difference to finally deliver a Champions League title to the blue half of Manchester.

City still had time to repeat their record win in a UEFA competition when De Bruyne rewarded his fine performance with an unstoppable goal in added time to make it 7-0 and complete Leipzig’s misery with their heaviest defeat ever.