Pep Guardiola breaks silence on Erling Haaland contract with clear message
Pep Guardiola believes Erling Haaland's contract extension shows an incredible amount of trust from the striker in Manchester City.
Haaland signed a shock contract extension on Friday, penning a mammoth nine-year extension until 2034. The striker will remain at City until he is 33, seemingly ending the prospect of a move to Real Madrid or another elite club.
He cited Guardiola as a major factor in committing the majority of his career to the Blues, and also expressed a desire to chase City's all-time goalscoring record and Alan Shearer's Premier League record of 260 goals.
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And Guardiola said Haaland can definitely exceed those numbers and praised the striker for signing on for so long when contracts like that rarely exist at the top level.
"Have you ever seen a player sign a ten year contract?" said Guardiola. "He comes from Norway - maybe the weather here is better. He settled perfectly, he loves the club, the people he's around. loves the Premier League, loves here, with his wife and father. No better place to be in the next ten years. So he and his family decide to stay.
"He is a special player, to find a player like Erling it's so difficult, when you have it, why not make an effort to keep him? If he continues with the numbers since he arrived, yeah [he can break the records]. It will depend on the team and him as well. It is exceptional news for the club, when one player decides to sign this kind of contract, never done before, it shows how much he wants to be here.
"Otherwise the agents say 'sign one or two years in ten years many things can happen.' It's proof of confidence in the club. I don't have a feeling he's the guy with this contract he will [lower his level]. He loves to play, a huge competitor. In the good and bad moments, get rid [of the memory] early, forget what happened and think in the next."
