Noel Gallagher, Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Jack Grealish and a topless Pep Guardiola all reacted with disbelief and laughter when Erling Haaland took to FaceTime so he could show off his fresh haircut.

Millions watched the clip across Haaland’s social media platforms, including his own YouTube channel. Gone were the flowing blonde locks; thousands of blonde wigs worn by Haaland fans at the World Cup would need a trim, and the Premier League’s preseason promotional hype montages would merit a redo.

One thing, however, hasn’t changed: the Premier League is Haaland’s league now.

After a summer in which the star power of individual players was showcased at the World Cup, Haaland stood tall among the game’s greats. It was the World Cup of Lamine Yamal, Lionel Messi, Kylian Mbappé, Jude Bellingham, Rodri, Harry Kane and Haaland, but of that esteemed group, just the 6-foot-5 Norwegian forward plays in the Premier League.

With the departures of Mohamed Salah (to Trabzonspor), and Son Heung-Min‘s exit to Major League Soccer the previous summer, Haaland is indisputably the biggest star in the league. It’s the same on the touchline. For the first time since the league’s inception back in 1992, we have a competition without any superstar manager: Sir Alex Ferguson, Arsene Wenger, Guardiola, Jose Mourinho and Jurgen Klopp are all working elsewhere or out of the coaching game.

But should this come as a concern to the Premier League? Is the world’s most dominant league losing appeal, or is it too big to fail?

The Premier League’s collective clout

When Sky Sports put together their iconic advert to herald the arrival of the Premier League in 1992, the theme was “a whole new ball game.” Set to the backdrop of “Alive and Kicking” by Simple Minds, players from the 22 clubs were engaged in a variety of activities, like joking around in the shower, lifting weights, delivering team talks, enjoying breakfast in bed, or juggling a ball.

It was a statement more than an advert: the Premier League is here. But in terms of global stars, Man United goalkeeper Peter Schmeichel was the Premier League’s sole representative in the top 30 of the 1992 FIFA World Player of the Year award.

The Premier League platform and its unparalleled reach boosts profiles and nurtures careers — Cristiano Ronaldo, Thierry Henry, Salah, Kane, Michael Olise, David Beckham, Luka Modric, Eric Cantona, Alan Shearer, Frank Lampard, Gareth Bale and Steven Gerrard all made their names in England’s top flight before eventually moving on.

“The popularity of the Premier League is outstretching and leading because of the international interest there is in the game, because over the course of, say, a decade, you’ll still see the world’s best players in the competition at some stage,” Shaun Harvey, non-executive director at Wrexham and former CEO of the EFL and Leeds United, tells ESPN.

There have been occasions where established stars arrive, like Ronaldo’s return to Manchester United in 2021, or Zlatan Ibrahimovic’s two-year spell at United from 2016-18: both men were globally renowned, but approaching the twilight of their career. The Premier League has had just three Ballon d’Or winners since 1992: Michael Owen (2001), Ronaldo (2008) and Rodri (2024). By and large, the award went to Ronaldo or Messi every time.

“If you are a Premier League administrator, perhaps you might be concerned about the absence of big-name superstars in the league,” Simon Chadwick, professor of AfroEurasian sport and specialist in 21st century global sport, tells ESPN. “But at the same time, what I think the Premier League has that other leagues around the world don’t have is brand equity in marketing terms,” a model not dissimilar from the NFL, where the teams themselves are the draw.

“There’s considerable equity in the brands of these clubs, but also considerable fan equity, too.”

Regardless, the collective self-assurance of the Premier League remains, 34 years on since it began, and the numbers say as much.

Deloitte’s latest “Annual Review of Football Finance” analyses collective revenues of the “big five” leagues and puts the Premier League top, by a comfortable distance: for the 2024-25 season, the Premier League’s collective revenue sat at €8.098 billion, with Bundesliga second (€4.3bn), La Liga third (€4.1bn), Serie A fourth (€3bn), and Ligue 1 fifth (€2.2bn).

There are other indicators of its collective strength.

Brand Finance’s recently published “Football 50” ranks clubs on their brand value. The Premier League has five teams in their top 10, with Arsenal third behind Real Madrid and Barcelona, and the competitiveness in England continues to attract eager buyers, like the consortium involving Jeff Bezos, who purchased a stake in Liverpool this summer. There’s no one-team monopoly like Ligue 1 (with Paris Saint-Germain) or the Bundesliga (Bayern Munich), or a duopoly like Barca and Real Madrid in LaLiga. OPTA’s ranking of the strongest leagues in the world puts the Premier League top, ahead of Bundesliga in second and LaLiga third.

“The competitive balance the Premier League has makes it a more enticing league for others overseas,” Chadwick says, though Haaland appears to be the exception as a player who attracts as much fandom as any team.

The haircut

Haaland had been warned about potential repercussions of getting rid of his famous blonde locks. “The season starts now so it’s time to get a fresh start,” Haaland said. “The only thing is, Zlatan [Ibrahimovic] told me never cut your hair, because your strength is in your hair.”

Haaland said he was nervous on his livestream, while the hairdresser tasked with the trim said it was “the most expensive haircut of all time.” Once the final haircut was revealed, Haaland laughed and said: “I can’t wait for the fans to sing ‘who the fucking hell is that?'” Then came the FaceTimes and celebrity reactions — a flex on Haaland’s part, but also a valuable insight into his personality and part of the wider strategy around him.

“He’s dominating,” Steve Martin, founding partner MSQ Sport & Entertainment, tells ESPN. “He’s the Premier League’s Trojan Horse. He’s heavily curated, but what he does is so natural.”

Haaland’s haircut could be the most famous haircut in the Premier League since Beckham shaved his hair in 2000. Martin worked with Beckham and Adidas on the Predator boots commercials back in 2003 and was behind the famous Beckham link-up with England rugby star — and World Cup winner — Jonny Wilkinson.

“There’s a machine running all of that, which is where Beckham was so successful and still is for years,” Martin says. “It’s thought through: there’s a PR machine, and it’s led by the star themselves. But the beauty of what Haaland is doing is it so authentic. There are parallels with what Beckham did 25 odd years ago. He’s got that machine behind it because he’s seen the opportunity, but the Beckham or Ronaldo level of fame or social media interest are rare beasts. They’re once in a generation, really.”

Haaland was one of the faces of the World Cup. He was an already established Champions League and Premier League star, but this summer saw his fanbase grow exponentially as fans watched him engage authentically with the U.S. culture while Norway worked their way through the tournament, whether he was expanding his taxidermy collection or buying a pair of cowboy boots in Texas.

His Instagram follower count alone went from 40.6m to 72.7m, an increase of 32.1m, the most of any player at the World Cup. But of the top 10 players who saw the greatest increase in their Instagram followers this summer, Haaland was the only one from the Premier League, per Sportico.

“His social leap in the World Cup is just unheard of,” Martin says. “Obviously there’s a lean into increasing his commercial power, but it’s very unforced.”

Adapting to the young generation

A potential hurdle on the horizon for the Premier League is the rise of how Gen Z and Gen Alpha consume football and the focus on individual players, which a source said was predominantly due to the popularity of EA FC, player’s own social media channels and the trading card community.

“The concern is what happens when Haaland leaves,” Martin says. “Once you’re in the leading position as a league, you need to defend it. Individually, he’s in the leadership position, no doubt.

“The Premier League in the past had so much stardust if you like. You had multiple teams with two or three big-name players, but this era is lacking the star power, and the individual players where you’re drawn to watching them regardless of who they’re playing. I think undoubtedly it could do with a few more global names to carry it into the next era.”

However, this trend is nothing new. “I’m convinced in the Premier League and in the UK, fans support teams, not players,” Harvey says. “You support your club and they your country, players haven’t even been a consideration at that time. They’ll have their favourites: fans will get a player on the back of their shirt, but it’s a club shirt they buy and wear.

“When you go outside the UK, then there is a lot more prevalence to how do you pick your team in the UK. Fewer fans are peer-pressured by geography, or friends and family influence, into who they support. If you’re in the U.S. or the Far East and the Premier League is in front of you, you’ll pick your team from what you see on TV.

“You are seeing more new fans picking teams because of a player, and they’re more likely to then follow the player as they transfer around, rather than staying loyal to the club. In the UK, fans stay with their club not the player. ‘The king is dead, long live the king’ is the mantra, and the previous king is likely to be booed when he turns up with the opposition.”

The change in the transfer market

Nobody would dispute the fact that individual stars draw a crowd. Look at Inter Miami and how they embraced Messi. Over the summer, we even saw 25,000 delighted fans greet Salah at Trabzonspor. Rodri was unveiled to thousands at the Nou Camp as part of Barcelona’s annual squad presentation before the Joan Gamper trophy.

We don’t really see those scenes in the Premier League anymore — certainly nothing like the fiesta Shearer received when he signed for Newcastle in 1996. Players in the Premier League are welcomed on the pitch during the half-time break or before the match — like Nico González‘s unveiling at Newcastle — but you won’t see a player juggling on the pitch in a one-off event like you do at the Bernabéu. There, Real Madrid fans are used to seeing Vinicius Jr., Bellingham and Yan Diomande every week. Barcelona boast Yamal, Rodri and Raphinha. PSG enjoy the skills of Ousmane Dembélé and Khvicha Kvaratskhelia — but all play in leagues whose executives watch the Premier League with understandable envy.

The clubs in the Premier League comfortably outspent any other league in the world this summer. The past transfer window saw the collective spend of the English top flight total at £3.46 billion, but much of that was spent on quality and depth rather than singular star power.

“I think for me, [Premier League clubs] have had a data-driven revolution, which has resulted more of a team-oriented approach to decision-making rather than a star-led or a Galacticos-led model that you see elsewhere in the world,” said Chadwick. “These new financial regulations do change the psychology of how teams are assembled and the ways in which clubs are run. Clubs are fascinated by how Brighton and Brentford have done things. You buy low and sell high.”

Even when spending big, clubs turn to tried-and-tested options. Out of the top 15 transfers on value, 11 were moves between Premier League clubs; Bradley Barcola‘s £120m move to Liverpool from PSG was an outlier.

Chadwick feels this is a result of the constraints of Squad Cost Ratio (SCR), a model where club’s on-pitch spending is restricted to “85% of their football-related revenue and net profit/loss from player sales,” according to the Premier League. Experts feel clubs will spend big on trusted Premier League-proven players. Clubs still spend on potential, and the rise of data and analytics mean these are meticulously planned; expensive gambles like Man United’s £86m spend on Antony back in 2022 are a thing of the past.

Of the transfers of players from overseas into the Premier League valued over €35m, just three players were aged over 23. Winger Christos Tzolis (from Club Brugge) had previous experience of the Premier League, defender Piero Hincapié had spent the season on loan at Arsenal (from Bayer Leverkusen) and defensive midfielder Mamadou Sangare (from Lens) is already regarded as one of the purchases of the season. “Clubs are looking for potential — you don’t go looking for current stars,” Chadwick says.

Chadwick remembers when his Middlesbrough brought in Juventus star Fabrizio Ravanelli to kick-start the club’s push for Europe. He scored, he raised his shirt over his head, and they were relegated. “English football has morphed back into what it always was, which is team-led rather than star-led,” Chadwick says.

In turn, this absence of big hitters on the touchline has further reinforced the strength of focus on Haaland.

“I do think that lack of star power on the touchline is a miss for the Premier League,” Martin says. “The tension between managers in the past is part of the story. There was great tension between Ferguson and Wenger, then Guardiola and Mourinho. These stories help elevate the whole league.”

Still, the Premier League rolls on. “Even players like Ronaldo, Haaland and Messi have a shelf life, but clubs don’t — nor does the Premier League,” Chadwick says. “A lot of the noise around the power of players tends to forget that players do get old, they do retire, they do transition to something else. But the clubs and the league remain.”

In short, the Premier League is as far-reaching as ever.

“The Premier League is the world’s league,” Harvey says. And despite a summer where Guardiola and Salah left, its clubs spent collectively more than any other league in the world and will continue to have the most eyeballs on it every single weekend, with Haaland taking up plenty of the spotlight.

“There’s absolutely no shortage of quality in the Premier League whatsoever,” Premier League CEO Richard Masters said during a preseason sit-down with reporters. “And while we’ve got a few big names leaving the stage, new stars and new stardust will emerge.”

Until then, the floor is Haaland’s.