It’s easy to choose the best scorers – there are statistics, there are goals scored, and they are the only ones who give out Golden Boot in the APL. We take the top ten scorers from the official site of the English Premier League and recall the best of their performances.
Les Ferdinand
351 games, 149 goals, 49 assists.
Les did not play for the top English clubs, played only one season away from England, never scored from the penalty spot or won a title. But in his first five seasons in the APL, Ferdinand scored 101 goals: 60 for CRC and 41 for Newcastle.
Michael Owen
326 games, 150 goals, 31 assists.
At 18, Owen played his first full season for Liverpool and then shared the APL Golden Boot with Dion Dublin and Chris Sutton, scoring 18 goals. Owen was the Premier League Player of the Season and also Player of the Month in August 1998. A year later, Michael again shared the title of top scorer in the championship, but now with Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink and Dwight Yorke – and again the forwards scored 18 goals each.
In seven seasons at Liverpool, Owen scored 118 goals and just 32 goals in the next eight seasons for Newcastle, Manchester United and Stoke City. Injuries prevented Michael from playing at Liverpool level again, but he still won the 2010/11 season, playing 11 games for Manchester United and scoring 2 goals.
Jermain Defoe
496 games, 162 goals, 33 assists.
The only player to score five goals in a single half was Tottenham’s 9-1 demolition of Wigan in 2009. He also played for West Ham, Portsmouth, Sunderland and Bournemouth. In the 2017/18 season, he scored the Goal of the Month, and in 2018/19, he came on as a substitute just four times and did not score. On January 6, 2019, Jermain Defoe left on loan to the Scottish Rangers for a year and a half.
Robbie Fowler
379 games, 163 goals, 39 assists.
His first hat-trick was already in the fifth game in the APL “Southampton”. And less than a year later, Robbie scored the fastest hat-trick in the history of the APL – Arsenal missed three goals from Fowler in 4 minutes and 42 seconds. That record was broken by Sadio Mane in 2015, scoring three goals in three minutes against Aston Villa.
Thierry Henry
258 games, 175 goals, 74 assists.
Henri played only for Arsenal in the APL, won the Golden Boot four times, was named player of the season twice, won the Premier League twice, and was named player of the month four times by Thierry.
Since the 2001/02 AFL, Henri has scored more than 20 goals in a season five years in a row: 24, 24, 30, 25 and 27. In the 2018/19 season, Sergio Agüero repeated the Frenchman’s achievement for the first time, scoring more than 20 goals for the fifth consecutive season.
Frank Lampard
609 games, 177 goals, 102 assists.
The world’s highest-scoring midfielder and fifth highest scorer in the APL. He is among eight players who have scored four or more goals in two different Premier League games. Frank set a league record by scoring for 39 different teams in the APL. From 2003 to 2013, he steadily shipped 10 or more goals to Chelsea’s opponents in a season.
The most “fruitful” season was 2009/10, when Lampard scored 22 goals and took fifth place in the list of APL strikers. In this case in first place was his teammate Didier Drogba with 29 goals.
Sergio Aguero
255 games, 177 goals, 46 assists.
The only player from the top 10 who continues to play in the Premier League. He won the Golden Boot in the 2014/15 season, was player of the month six times, and took the APL championship four times. One of Sergio’s most memorable goals was a late CRC goal that guaranteed Manchester City the title in 2012.
Agüero played eight seasons in the APL and scored fewer than 20 goals in only two. In the 2018/19 season, Sergio scored 20 goals in 31 games and repeated Shearer’s record of 11 hat tricks in the APL.
In the 2019/20 season, Agüero scored his 177th league goal in the Week 22 match against Aston Villa. With this, he surpassed Henri to become the top scorer and legionnaire of the APL. The hat-trick was the 12th for Sergio and a record for the English championship. Agüero surpassed Alan Shearer, who has 11 hat-tricks under his belt.
Andy Cole
414 games, 187 goals, 73 assists.
He scored 68 goals in 84 games for Newcastle before shocking the UK by moving to Manchester United for a record £7m. He won the Golden Boot in the 1993/94 season, won the APL Championship five times and player of the month once. With MJ took the treble in 1999, winning the APL, the FA Cup and the Champions League.
Wayne Rooney
491 games, 208 goals, 103 assists.
The 16-year-old Rooney’s first in the APL was a goal against Arsenal in October 2002. After that, Wayne won the AFL five times, was named player of the month five times, player of the season once and received the Goal of the Month award in the 2017/18 season.
Rooney scored 25 goals for Everton and 178 for Manchester United in 17 APL seasons and dished out 103 assists in the Premier League, more than only Ryan Giggs and Cesc Fabregas.
Alan Shearer
441 games, 260 goals, 64 assists.
In the 1994/95 season Shearer won the Premier League with Blackburn, was named player of the season and became the league’s top scorer for the first time. During his career Alan earned three Golden Boot awards (1994/95, 1995/96 and 1996/97 seasons) and was named player of the month four times.
Blackburn Rovers owner Jack Walker was so keen to keep Shearer in the team in 1996 that he offered him the role of playing coach at 25. But Alan Shearer still moved to Newcastle for 15 million pounds, setting a world transfer record.
Shearer holds the record for most hat-tricks in a season – 5 in 1995/96. There are 11 hat-tricks under Alan’s belt – second only to Sergio Agüero. Shearer is also among five players who have scored five goals in one match. Alan performed a penta-trick in the game against Sheffield Wansday in 1999.
The APL has not yet seen another goal-scoring machine like him.