Executioner of the national team, Haaland gains millions of followers with the 'Brazil effect'; see impact

Haaland decides and Brazil is eliminated by Norway in the round of 16 of the World Cup
He gained prominence on social media as soon as Brazilians discovered that Norway would be Brazil's opponent in the round of 16 of the World Cup. It became a meme, joined in the fun and, in the end, also became the protagonist of the match.
On the field, striker Erling Haaland took no notice of the Brazilian team and scored the two goals that eliminated Carlo Ancelotti's team. Meanwhile, outside the four lines, he experienced another phenomenon: the strength of Brazilians' mobilization on the internet.
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The Norwegian star gained 1.1 million followers on Instagram on Sunday (5), the day of the match. The following day, it added another 5 million, reaching a jump of 6.1 million followers in just 48 hours. The data comes from Social Blade, a platform that monitors social media metrics.
To get an idea of the scale of this growth, Haaland accumulated 13 million new followers in the 30 days ending on Monday (6). This means that almost half (47%) of this advance happened precisely during the period in which the attacker faced Brazil.
Haaland's profile soars after 'Brazil effect'
Arte/g1
According to André Eler, technical director of data consultancy Bites, some factors help to explain Haaland's explosion on the networks. One of them is exactly the so-called "Brazil effect", driven by the mobilization of fans during the World Cup.
"The repercussion in Brazil is one of the main drivers. It is exceptional because Brazilians breathe football all the time and pay a lot of attention to the tournament", he says.
Erling Haaland, from Norway, celebrates the team's first goal
Reuters/Vincent Carchietta
Memes involving Haaland, Vini Jr. and other athletes from the Brazilian team also helped boosting the Norwegian's profile. In the wake of this movement, followers came.
The most successful publication, created by artificial intelligence (AI) on the eve of the match, recreates a scene from the comedy White Girls (2004), to the sound of "A Thousand Miles", by Vanessa Carlton. In the video, Vini Jr. appears as Latrell Spencer and Haaland is characterized as one of the film's protagonists.
In one of the posts, the meme exceeded 94.1 million views and 9.1 million likes. The reach was also boosted by the comment from Haaland himself, who joined in the fun and tagged Vini, saying: "We need to recreate this".
AI video recreates a scene from the film "The White Girls" with Haaland and Vini Jr.
Reproduction
Sympathy also counts
In addition to reacting to the memes, Haaland made respectful statements about the team and the Brazilians. This helped to build a positive relationship with the country, which also contributed to the surge in the networks.
"He has the advantage of always having been friendly and respectful when talking about Brazil. This increases this identification a little, even though he was the executioner of the selection", assesses André Eler, from Bites.
The expert states that Brazilians are the Norwegian star's second main audience on the networks, behind only the Germans. "It is very likely that Brazil will become the player's largest global audience after the tournament."
There is also another decisive factor for this success: the showcase of the World Cup itself. The competition increases athletes' exposure in the media and on networks - even more so when they eliminate the most successful team in history.
"It's worth remembering that the World Cup is still one of the most relevant sporting and television events in the world. So, it also has an impact outside [Brazil], due to the exposure that these players have in their own countries", adds Eler.
It wasn't just Haaland
Not for nothing, another protagonist of the match against Brazil also entered the public's radar.

After saving a penalty, having a decisive performance and clashing with Neymar at the end of the game, goalkeeper Ørjan Nyland more than tripled the number of followers on Instagram.
Nyland's numbers are much lower than Haaland's, but, proportionally, the impact was greater. He went from 93.6 thousand followers on the eve of the match to 287.7 thousand the day after the match - a jump of more than 194 thousand followers.
"In the case of Nyland, we see a lot of people going to the networks to demand that he respect Neymar", says André Eler. "This type of engagement ends up boosting the content, feeding the algorithm and translating into new followers", he adds.
Fantástico showed how the fight went.
Neymar reacts while Norwegian goalkeeper Ørjan Nyland watches.
Reuters
But the phenomenon is not restricted to the duel between Brazil and Norway. Another example is that of Vozinha, goalkeeper from Cape Verde, who won over the Brazilians - and also ended up gaining worldwide recognition.
In his case, the rise was even more impressive: Vozinha gained more than 11.5 million followers on Instagram in the last 30 days, according to data from Social Blade.
The main jump occurred on July 4, one day after the heroic performance of the Cape Verdean team against Argentina. Despite the elimination of the African team, the goalkeeper gained 6.7 million new followers in 24 hours.
Experts have already explained to g1 that this type of growth could mean money in your pocket. This is because the amount paid for advertising actions on networks usually depends, mainly, on the number of followers and the engagement of the publications.
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Haaland jokes with Vini Jr. about meme from the film 'The White Girls'

Source: G1

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