Walter Finch
NORWEGIAN goal machine Erling Haaland was caught up in a police raid at a famous Marbella beach club.
The Manchester City star was even forced to hand over his ID to balaclava-wearing, machine gun-toting cops in Playa Padre on Sunday afternoon.
Hundreds of tourists and revellers were ordered out of the pool and to line up in the afternoon heat to identify themselves to police.
The raid will have come as a shock to Haaland, who is not playing at this summer’s Euro 2024 tournament as Norway did not qualify.
He has long favoured Marbella as an R&R destination, and he is not thought to be suspected of any wrongdoing.
READ MORE: Haaland hearts Marbella once again and hits up Playa Padre chiringuito
The Premier League’s top scorer was most likely simply in the wrong place at the wrong time as Marbella police executed another crackdown on drug mafias running rampant in the Costa del Sol resort.
He was later spotted visiting Bolonia Beach in Tarfia after being spotted in Sotogrande and at a petrol station in Algeciras with his blue Ferrari.
But on Sunday afternoon he had to cooperate with the 50 police officers who stormed the beach club in the midst of the Boho Sunday party as a police helicopter hovered overhead.
Police spent about an hour in the beach club inspecting IDs and interviewing attendees.
Videos emerged on social media of the 6ft 4in (194cm) Nordic giant partying hard in the DJ booth as the party got back under way as though nothing had happened.
Only one arrest was made of a woman who was wanted by a local court.
The raid comes three weeks after a similar police operation startled partygoers at the famous Ocean Beach club in neighbouring Puerto Banus.
Real Padel club in Nueva Andalucia was also raided and three suspected drug traffickers arrested in May.
The searches are thought to be part of Operation Marbella, a joint operation launched in April involving the region’s crack anti-drug police units UDYCO and GRECO.
It will involve an increase in the number of officers who will be on duty in the resort until the month of October, with the aim of combating organised and common crime.
There will be increased numbers of visible police on Marbella’s streets who will carry out a heightened number of checks on vehicles and people, according to a Policia Nacional spokesperson.
According to the report issued by the Malaga Provincial Police Station, during the month of May,
Cops have inspected a dozen discos and beach clubs in 300 security checks, according to local police, have identified 3,000 people and inspected some 1,300 vehicles.
Not even the cops could mark him!