A South Carolina-based influencer’s fame has skyrocketed after thousands of fans claimed she is a doppelganger for World Cup superstar Erling Haaland.
Emma Kate Willman, who is from Charleston, first made her name online by posting hair tutorials and showing her followers how she styles her braids and plaits.
Yet during this summer’s World Cup, Willman suddenly noticed that her Instagram notifications were blowing up a little more than usual.
‘I think that I’ve had probably over 100,000 comments in the last two hours, saying how much I look like [Erling Haaland],’ she said earlier this week.
‘First of all, the best doppelganger you give me is a male soccer player? Really? Can’t we just go back to when you guys were calling me Zara Larsson?
‘No offense to Haaland at all, but I am very much just a little girl from Charleston.’
A South Carolina-based influencer has gone viral after being compared to Erling Haaland
Emma Kate Willman’s Instagram comments have been flooded with Haaland references
On several of her videos over the past month, soccer fans have teased Willman about her uncanny resemblance to the Norway striker.
One wrote on a clip of her applying face scrub and styling her hair: ‘Everyone is talking about Haaland’s diet routine. Here is the beauty routine.’
‘I dare Haaland to drop a stinker. This reel is going triple platinum,’ another user joked.
A third put: ‘@erling found your long lost sister’.
While one went straight to the point and simply said: ‘Damn you look so much like haaland’.
Willman has since seen the funny side of it and played up to the Haaland comparisons, even trying to slick her hair back like the Manchester City hero in one video which has generated over one million likes.
Haaland himself has also commented on one of her Instagram posts, simply writing: ‘Hi’ along with a thumbs-up emoji.
After seeing the funny side of the doppelganger claims Willman tried to style her hair like him
She is also hosting a Haaland lookalike contest with sports betting company Kalshi on Saturday
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Is it fair for female influencers to be compared to male athletes, or does it undermine their identity?
Now Willman is set to head to Miami for Norway’s quarterfinal showdown with England on Saturday, where she will be hosting an Erling Haaland lookalike contest with sports betting company Kalshi. The chosen winner will receive two tickets to the game.
She said in a video promoting the lookalike contest on Thursday: ‘I was sitting in bed last night and I had the craziest idea: What if we put everybody who looks like Haaland in the same room?
‘Then I found a brand crazy enough to even help me back this. I literally don’t know how I got them to do this.’
The contest will be taking place close to Hard Rock Stadium at Bayfront Park Fountain at 1pm ET this Saturday, four hours before Haaland and Norway lock horns with England for a place in the World Cup semifinals.
