Aston Villa attacker Morgan Rogers has admitted that stopping Erling Haaland directly is virtually impossible, but England can neutralise the Norway striker by cutting off his service. Speaking ahead of England's World Cup quarter-final clash with Norway, Rogers acknowledged the immense challenge posed by the Manchester City star.
Rogers: No secret to stopping Haaland
Rogers, 23, conceded that there is no proven method to nullify Haaland, despite the Norwegian having failed to score in his last four appearances against Aston Villa. “Has anyone ever stopped Erling Haaland? I'm not sure they have but we are going to have to try,” Rogers said. “I think he's such an unbelievable player, the things he does, the numbers he puts up, you're just in awe of how good he is and the level he's at.”
The England international emphasised that the key lies in disrupting Norway's overall play rather than focusing solely on Haaland. “We're going to have to maybe try and stop how they play and work on those things and stop how the balls go into him and how he gets his chances because he's so deadly in front of goal,” Rogers explained. “We've got to be aware of that. We've got to know that. But also, it's not just him. They've got other good players as well that we play against regularly in the Premier League that we need to be mindful of. They're a really good team. I think that's what their biggest super strength is, that as a team, as a unit, they're so strong.”
England's mindset ahead of quarter-final
Rogers also opened up about England's mentality after reaching the last eight, admitting that dreams of the final are creeping in. “A bit of both I think,” he said when asked if he had allowed himself to think ahead. “We're human and you can't help think that every game win is a step closer to the end goal but at the same time if you take your eye off the ball for any second I think that's where you can get punished. In this game it's really fine margins. It can be mentality of going into a game that can decide the game and be the difference so I think we have to dust ourselves off.”
Rogers revealed that England have broken the tournament down into stages to maintain focus. “We've kind of broke it down to different stages of the tournament and how we attack it and how we see it going and that can kind of switch our mindset differently and we're all aligned, we're all on the same page of attacking each game in the best way possible really so I think it's difficult. We're all human and we're all excited as we should be.”
