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The competition for the Golden Boot trophy is intensifying as the 2025-26 season approaches its midway point.

With a new winner in each of the past three campaigns, the prize remains up for grabs. Premier League star Erling Haaland was the most recent Premier League-based striker to win the award back in 2022-23.

The prodigious Norwegian striker is back in the running this term, but faces formidable competition from Bayern Munich forward Harry Kane and Spanish La Liga superstar Kylian Mbappe. With plenty of games remaining, other talents still have time to enter the fray.

Understanding the European Golden Shoe Award?

The Golden Boot award was first launched in the 1967-68 by the France-based publication L'Equipe to recognize the leading scorer in domestic league matches from a European top division league.

Since the 1997-98, the award has been overseen by European Sports Media, which introduced a points-based scoring system. Under this format, a player's tallies are multiplied by a designated coefficient based on the strength ranking of their domestic competition.

Goals scored in the continent's top five leagues—the Premier League, La Liga, German Bundesliga, Italian Serie A, and Ligue 1—are worth two points each.

For competitions ranked from sixth to twenty-second in UEFA rankings, such as the Portuguese Primeira Liga, goals are worth 1.5 points. Goals in lower-ranked European leagues are worth one point.

While the honor has been shared on multiple instances in the past, a rule change from the 2019-20 states that in the event of a tie, the award goes to the player with the fewest minutes played.

If the deadlock remains, the next tiebreaker is the total of league assists, followed by the fewest goals from the penalty spot. Only after these tiebreakers are used would the award be shared.

Who are the Main Contenders?

At present, a three-way tussle exists for the current season's Golden Shoe, with the three previous winners separated by just a single goal.

• Harry Kane (English captain) leads with 19 goals (38 points) from 15 Bundesliga games.
• Erling Haaland also has 19 goals (38 points) from 17 Premier League appearances.
• Kylian Mbappe sits one back on 18 goals (36 points) in 18 La Liga matches.

In fourth place is RFS striker Darko Lemajic of Latvian side RFS, who has scored 28 goals (28 points) across the club's 36 league games in 2025.

Feyenoord striker Ayase Ueda is joint-fifth with 18 goals (27 points) from 17 Eredivisie matches this term.

The remainder of the current top ten is made up of players from leagues that function on a January-to-December schedule.

A Look at Previous Recipients

Throughout its 59-year history, the Golden Shoe has been awarded to some of football's biggest names.

Portuguese legend Eusebio claimed the first-ever trophy in 1968, scoring forty-two goals for Benfica. He later secured the award for a second time in the 1972-73.

Argentine maestro Lionel Messi has won the record number of Golden Shoes, claiming the award on six separate occasions during his long spell at Barcelona.

Messi set the record for highest tally in a single season with fifty in 2011-12 (100 points). He also became the only player to ever to win it in three straight seasons from 2016 to 2019.

Portuguese megastar Cristiano Ronaldo claimed his first award in the 2007-08 with Manchester United before going on to win it on three further occasions with Real Madrid.

The inaugural player to win the award while at an English club was Liverpool's Ian Rush in 1983-84, when he scored 32 goals for Liverpool FC.

The prize has seen a different winner in each of the last three seasons.

Erling Haaland claimed the award for the first time in 2022-23, scoring a Premier League record-equaling thirty-six goals (72 points). Harry Kane secured his maiden Golden Shoe with the same total for Bayern Munich the following year.

Kylian Mbappe is the reigning holder of the award after scoring thirty-one goals (62 points) for Real Madrid in 2024-25.

Now, the very trio are vying at the summit of the standings once more this season, with Kane currently leading the way.