The European Golden Shoe is given to the player with the most points based on goals scored at the end of each season. Goals in the Premier League, La Liga, Bundesliga, Ligue 1 and Serie A score two points each. Strikes in the European leagues that have a UEFA coefficient between six and 21 earn one and a half points, while leagues below that get a point for each goal.
Kylian Mbappé won in 2024/25, with Harry Kane taking the honours prior to that and Erling Haaland the victor in 2022/23 when he helped fire Manchester City to an amazing treble in his first season with the club. Robert Lewandowski won the European Golden Shoe in both of the two seasons before that, and he is the last player to claim the award more than once.
However, it seems highly likely that one of the three previous winners will join the elite list of players to have claimed the Golden Boot (as it is also known) more than once. Mbappé, Haaland and Kane have set a truly blistering pace at the start of this campaign, all three scoring at a rate of better than a goal a game.
The Season So Far
There is, of course, a long way to go in most major European leagues. The table below shows the current standings and the advantage the “big three” have over the chasing pack.
| Player | Points | Goals | Games Played | Club |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Erling Haaland | 26 | 13 | 10 | Manchester City |
| Kylian Mbappé | 26 | 13 | 11 | Real Madrid |
| Harry Kane | 24 | 12 | 9 | Bayern Munich |
| Ayase Ueda | 19.5 | 13 | 11 | Feyenoord |
Ueda is having a brilliant season under Robin van Persie, but his goals in the Dutch Eredivisie deliver only 1.5 points each. He would need to score over 33.3% more goals than all of the more famous trio above him in the standings and so we firmly believe this is a three-horse race.
It would take a brave fan or pundit to try to predict how this race will end up. However, the weekend just gone saw a change in the standings, with Kane failing to add to his tally while his rivals both netted braces. Kane began Bayern’s clash with Leverkusen on the bench. He came on with over half an hour remaining but could not get his name on the scoresheet as his side coasted to a 3-0 win.
On a list of priorities for these footballers, winning the European Golden Shoe is way down at the bottom. The award dates back to 1968 and has been won by legends of the game, including Lionel Messi (who won it a record six times), Cristiano Ronaldo, Gerd Müller and Eusebio. However, the Balon d’Or is a far bigger individual prize, while team silverware is what all three attackers will crave.
Even so, Mbappé and Haaland will be well aware of how the other is getting on, and both will have been pleased to cash in on Kane’s rare goalless game. Mbappé got two, the first a penalty, s Real thrashed Valencia 4-0 in the capital. Haaland’s double helped City beat Bournemouth 3-1 at the Etihad, and now he heads the table by virtue of having played fewer minutes this term than Mbappé.
With all three leading contenders firing in the goals at a rate of better than one a game, it seems likely that the winner this year will need to have a sensational season. Assuming all three stay fit, it could be the case that 40 or more goals are needed to claim glory this term. Only once in the past nine seasons has a player in the top five leagues bagged 40+ goals, Lewandowski doing so in 2020/21 when he got 41.
Haaland has scored in eight of his 10 league outings for City. Five times he has netted twice, although he is yet to hit a league hat-trick this term. Mbappé has not fired a treble yet either, but has only failed to score once in 11 Liga games, netting twice on three occasions. Kane, in contrast, already boasts two hat-tricks, from just nine appearances. He has scored in six of his nine Bundesliga outings and may need to improve that rate given the German league features two fewer teams and four fewer matches than either the Premier League or the Spanish top flight.
Golden Shoe Race Set to Go the Wire
Hopefully, we will see a thrilling season-long title race in both England and Spain, if not Germany, where Bayern are already five points clear. In that context, the battle for the European Golden Shoe will not attract all that much attention. However, as fans, we should all appreciate what a wonderful, golden age we are in when it comes to top-class goalscorers.
With Messi and Ronaldo no longer playing in Europe, or at the top of their game, we might have assumed their goal-getting feats would not be matched for many years. But this incredible trio look capable of motivating each other to achieve the sort of things that only Messi and CR7 have managed in recent times. Such goalscoring is not normal, but these are phenomenal players and the rest of the season promises to be a real treat.