Erling Haaland says watching the World Cup from home has only made his desire to play at the tournament stronger, as he declared himself 'raring to go' for the rest of the season.
Haaland is one of the most high-profile players not to be involved in the 2022 World Cup after Norway failed to qualify, with the Manchester City striker taking some time to relax before heading to Abu Dhabi this week with his teammates to prepare for the resumption of the domestic season.
Speaking from Abu Dhabi, where he trained alone on Wednesday doing fitness work, Haaland said he has enjoyed the World Cup and is now focussed fully on helping City win silverware in 2023. He missed a number of games before the Premier League took a break, however he says the time off has been positive and he is in a good place ahead of the second half of the campaign.
Explaining his future World Cup ambitions, Haaland told the National : "The World Cup is great to watch for any football fan. Of course I would prefer to be there playing, but it’s the best teams and the best players competing against each other.
"There have been some fantastic performances and some that maybe people wouldn’t have expected. Now we’re into the most exciting part of the tournament when one little mistake and you could be out which makes it even more enjoyable to watch.
"It’s been a good opportunity to reset. Of course every player wants to be at the World Cup. It’s my dream to represent my country there and I’ll work hard to make sure that I do that one day. But the break has been positive.
"I’ve had the chance to rest, to take my mind off football for a few weeks and put myself in the best possible place to return. I can’t wait for it to start again. I’m raring to go."
Haaland also reflected on his electric start to life at City, where he has scored 23 goals in 18 appearances so far. However, with City trailing Arsenal by five points in the Premier League, the striker knows there is still work to do.
"It’s been positive. I feel like I’ve settled into the team and the league which can always take some adapting to and I’ve been pleased with how it’s started," he said.
"But it’s not about me. It’s about the team, how we’re performing and the second half of the season is the most important now. We’ve put ourselves in a good position and we’ve had lot of strong performances, but we’re second in the league and that’s not where we want to finish.
"We have to hit the ground running when we return because we have some tough games across the different competitions and we want to win them all.
"Our focus is always on the next game. I know it’s cliche and people might not like that, but if you get ahead of yourself then you lose focus. The challenge now is for us to get back up to speed and playing how we know we can. This training camp will be important for a number of us to do that and the rest of the guys will join us when their World Cup ends.
"The focus will be on getting fit, getting ready and then heading into the game against Liverpool looking to get a positive result and giving our fans something to be excited about as we head into the second half of the season."