Coaching seminars held by the Norwegian Football Federation have been known to play a short video that shows a 16-year-old boy taking part in a shooting drill.Footage has been captured from behind the goal and most of the 20 attempts, to be kind, are wayward. The aspiring coaches in attendance are asked if the youngster has what it takes to play for Norway.“Everyone says no because in the video it looks like a poor striker,” says Hakon Grottland, the long-standing head of player development within Norway’s national association.Perhaps the distinctive blond hair, kept short at the time, provides a clue but the boy spraying shots in all directions has become Norway’s talisman and the world’s best centre forward: Erling Haaland.“Maybe that’s also why he has become the best because he missed the most and trained and trained,” adds Grottland. “The other thing you can clearly see in the video is that it is just Erling, a coach and the goalkeeper. The rest of the team is on the bus back to the hotel but Erling wanted to keep getting better.”Haaland is now the man standing between England and the World Cup semi-finals.His match-winning brace against Brazil in the last 16 delivered Norway’s greatest ever result last Sunday, and his total of seven goals has the Manchester City forward trailing only Lionel Messi and Kylian Mbappe in the race for the Golden Boot.The last month has been Haaland’s big bang. For all the goals he has plundered across elite competitions, such as the Premier League, Champions League and Bundesliga, his enormous impact on this World Cup (Norway’s first since 1998) has propelled him to new heights of stardom. The United States — and wider world — is now wide awake to Haaland’s vast appeal.And it is not just his attacking talents. Haaland has been the World Cup’s biggest personality; a self-deprecating, smiling figurehead that has seldom looked happier than in a golden month with Norway. He orchestrated the post-match celebrations by banging the supporters’ drum after beating Brazil and then, in a moment that typified his unserious side, came for those who doubted him.