🏆 Ballon d'OneFootball: A freakish goalscorer in 9th place

Welcome to the 2024 Ballon d'OneFootball.

Over the next 10 days, we will be counting down our top 10 men's footballers in the world right now, before revealing the winner on 27 July 2024.

You can read here how we voted for this year's award.

And here is our list so far.

Today we continue with...

9th: Erling Haaland, Manchester City and Norway

Goals in 2023/24: 38

Assists in 2023/24: 6

Trophies won in 2023/2024: Premier League, FIFA Club World Cup, UEFA Super Cup

Highest ranking among voters: EN 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿/ES 🇪🇸 (7th)

Why were they nominated?

Erling Haaland may not have lived up to the ludicrous heights of his first year in England but there was certainly no Second Season Syndrome for the Manchester City man.

Haaland still ended the 2023/24 term as the Premier League's top goalscorer and handed Pep Guardiola's side their fourth consecutive title - a feat no side had reached before.

Best moment since the start of 2023/24?

As City went toe-to-toe with Arsenal for the Premier League title, those dying weeks of last season were when the club's big players had to turn up.

Thankfully for Guardiola, Haaland did exactly that with the key moment coming on May 14. A defeat against Tottenham would have handed the Gunners a clear advantage in the title race with just one more game to go.

The Norwegian goal machine was at his clinical best however as he netted twice in a 2-0 away win that all but confirmed the trophy.