With the English Premier league having played its last game on the last day of the year, 2023 draws its curtain as the 2023/2024 football season in most of the top divisions in Europe reaches the halfway mark.
In the five biggest national leagues, 16 to 20 match weeks have been played so far.
Here is the list of leading scorers in top leagues of England, Spain, Italy, Germany, and France.
21 goals: Harry Kane, Bundesliga
After 16 match weeks, Bayern Munich forward and England captain, Harry Kane has cleared the doubts following his surprise move from the English Premier League. His first campaign in the German Bundesliga has been nothing but incredible.
With 21 goals at the 16th week, Harry Kane looks to be eyeing the Bundesliga record of 40 goals, set by his predecessor at Bayern, Robert Lewansdowski.
The current runner-up on the goal table is Serhou Guirassy of VfB Stuttgart, the Guinean playmaker with 17 goals.
18 Goals: Kylian Mbappe, Ligue 1
The PSG star has been a regular on the French Ligue 1 goal table since his move from Monaco in 2017.
After 17 games this season, Kylian Mbappe has emerged with 18 goals, ahead of all others, with his closest competitor being 10 goals behind, Wissam Ben Yedder of Monaco, at 8 goals.
At Paris Saint-Germain, Mbappe has netted an annual average of 24 goals throughout, and he doesn’t look to fail in the current campaign, with fans hoping he would beat his last season tally of 30 goals.
15 goals: Lautaro Martinez, Seria A
At the Italian league, Argentine and Inter’s striker Lautaro Martinez hopes to keep his table-topping side leading while he dominates the Serie A goal scoresheet. His closest rival for the Italian golden boot, Domenico Berardi of Sassuolo is only at a distant 9 goals.
Lautaro was only a year ago a World Cup winner, will look to grab Serie A’s top scorer’s baton from Napoli’s Victor Osimhen, as well as win the Scudetto for the Nerazzurri, which they last won in 2021.
14 goals: Erling Haaland, Premier League
As the English Premier League completed its 20th games in 2023, Manchester City’s marksman Erling Haaland has succeeded in keeping the top goal scoring place, despite his injury break.
His manager, Pep Guardiola only hopes to see him return to action January end. The Norwegian who is never known to shake in front of the goalpost, is set to boost his league scoring average.
As he aims for a consecutive Premier League Golden Boot, Haaland hopes to not be overtaken by second-placed Mohamed Salah and/or Dominic Solanke, who have 12 goals each.
Though Solanke has failed to register any goal for Bournemouth on the last day of the year against Tottenham, stats show that the English centre-forward has recorded 13 goal contributions at the end of last season. Hence he remains a formidable threat to Haaland and Salah.
13 goals: Jude Bellingham, La Liga
Jude Bellingham is another English top flight goal scorer for the Spanish La Liga leaders, Real Madrid. The 20 year old attacking midfielder, who joined Santiago Bernabéu last July has been in superb form and he has bagged 13 goals so far.
After 18 games in the 2023/2024 season, Bellingham has led Carlo Ancelotti's men to share the top spot in La Liga standing with Girona, at the close of 2023.
Out of the above five goal kings, the most consistently cited favorite to win the European Golden Shoe award is Man City’s Erling Haaland. As for who could give the Norwegian a serious chase, it could be said that the biggest individual accolade is Bayern’s Harry Kane to lose.
