Mohamed Salah and Son Heung-min have shared the Premier League Golden Boot award this season, having finished with 23 goals each in 2021/22.
Harry Kane was the defending champion after withstanding a long challenge from Salah to narrowly finish first in the top scorer charts with 23 goals last season.
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It was Kane’s third success, equaling the tally of Golden Boot triumphs held by the EPL’s all-time top scorer, Alan Shearer.
This year, Kane was looking for what would have been a record fourth crown.
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Salah and Bruno Fernandes, who each made the podium last season, entered the campaign hoping to challenge again, while proven Premier League goalscorer Romelu Lukaku returned to Chelsea after a spell prolific in Serie A with Inter.
Man Utd then brought Cristiano Ronaldo back to Old Trafford in a sensational return, making 2021/22 the most competitive Golden Boot race in years.
Former winner Jamie Vardy, Leeds striker Patrick Bamford, Everton’s Dominic Calvert-Lewin, West Ham star Michail Antonio and Aston Villa duo Ollie Watkins and Danny Ings are part of a strong contingent of teams outside the English ‘big six’ who were listed as contenders when the season started.
This page has been updated throughout the season as we took an in-depth look at the latest ranking of players with the most EPL goals. With the high-flying campaign now over, we have the final results.
The Premier League’s Golden Boot race ended in a direct battle between Mohamed Salah and Son Heung-min in the final weeks of the season.
In the end, Liverpool striker Salah and Tottenham star Son shared the prize after an exciting year.
Salah scored 23 league goals in the 2021/22 campaign, with that final tally coming from 35 appearances (30 starts).
He alone topped the England goalscoring charts for most of the campaign.
However, Salah has scored just four goals in his last 11 top-flight outings this season, allowing some of his main rivals to close in on the table and in-form Son to finally catch up.
The Egyptian star needed to score just six minutes from Liverpool’s 3-1 victory over Wolves on the final day of the season just to claim a share of the prize money.
This was because Son had risen to the top of the leaderboard. He ends the campaign having scored 23 goals in 35 Premier League starts.
The Spurs striker has scored 12 times in his last 10 Premier League appearances and, after netting a brace as his side clinched Champions League qualification by beating Norwich City 5-0 on the final day, would have won without Salah’s goal against Wolves.
Cristiano Ronaldo, meanwhile, has missed out on golden boot glory this season.
The Portuguese star however finished in a respectable third place, having concluded the season strong from an individual point of view.
Ronaldo has scored nine league goals since March 12 despite missing a few matches – such as the final game of the season at Crystal Palace – securing a podium spot for the 37-year-old.
The veteran has made fewer starts – just 27 – than anyone who has finished in the top five.
Son’s teammate Harry Kane climbed to fourth place to finish with 17 goals for the year in 37 outings.
The former Golden Boot winner has rallied after an unusually slow start to the season amid a period of intense transfer speculation linking him with Man City.
England captain Kane has scored four times in his last three games to finish just ahead of Ronaldo.
Salah’s Liverpool teammate Sadio Mane finished fifth with 16 goals as the Reds and Spurs topped the table.
Mane finished one ahead of Diogo Jota, who has spent much of the season as Salah’s key challenger, only to lose momentum amid intense competition to attack places at Liverpool when he hasn’t managed to score in his last seven EPL outings.
Man City top scorer Kevin De Bruyne finished tied for sixth with 15, boosted by his sensational four-goal output in the 5-1 win over Wolves towards the end of the campaign.
And another former Golden Boot champion Jamie Vardy moved to 15 goals after scoring five times in four games for Leicester City to end the season on a high.
The trio finished just ahead of Crystal Palace star Wilfried Zaha (14), while Man City striker Raheem Sterling completes the top 10 with 13 goals to his name.
Brentford’s Ivan Toney, West Ham’s Jarrod Bowen, and Leicester’s James Maddison all scored 12 goals for the campaign.
They were ahead of an 11-man squad that contained the league’s top scorers for Arsenal and Chelsea, English duo Bukayo Saka and Mason Mount.
A total of 25 players have reached double figures in the Premier League this season, including Bruno Fernandes and Michail Antonio, who appeared to be contenders earlier in the campaign.
EPL 2021/22 top scorers
Who are the former Premier League Golden Boot winners?
Winners of the EPL Golden Boot
The record for most goals in a season is shared by Alan Shearer (1994/95) and Andy Cole (1993/94).
Both players scored an astonishing 34 goals, despite having a longer season back then – Shearer did it in 42 games and Cole in 40.
Mohamed Salah came close to that record in 2017/18, scoring 32 times in 36 outings, producing the best Premier League goalscoring season for 13 years.
The Golden Boot winner with the best goals-per-game ratio in a season is Harry Kane.
The England captain scored 29 times in just 30 games to win the 2016/17 title, averaging 0.97 goals per game.
Prior to this season, Arsenal and Liverpool had the most Premier League Golden Boot winners, with six each. Going into this campaign, Man Utd had five while Tottenham and Chelsea had four.
There were only three players who had scored the most EPL goals more than twice.
Shearer has won the Golden Boot three times, once with Newcastle and twice with Blackburn Rovers, while Kane’s win in 2020/21 was also his third.
Salah’s success this season means he has now joined that list of treble winners.
Thierry Henry holds the record, however, having been named the Premier League’s top scorer four times for Arsenal.
Cristiano Ronaldo and Luis Suarez have both won the award, scoring 31 goals in 2007/08 and 2013/14 respectively.
The Premier League started in the 1992/93 season.
Before that, Ian Wright was England’s last top scorer when it came to the former Premier League.
Gary Lineker and Alan Smith were also winners in the 1990s before the league was rebranded.
Premier League: Player stats including appearances, goals, and assists
Who are the Premier League’s all-time top scorers?
Alan Shearer is the Premier League’s all-time top scorer, having ended his career in 2006 with a magnificent 260 goals to his name in the English Premier League.
Man Utd legend Wayne Rooney (208) is the only other player to score over 200 EPL goals.
Andy Cole (187), Sergio Aguero (184), Frank Lampard (177), and Thierry Henry (175) are other former Premier League players to top the all-time list.
Kane is the highest-scoring active player and scored 166 goals on his debut this season.
He has long been cited as one of the few contenders with a chance to match Shearer’s record total.
Before the start of 2021/22, Robbie Fowler (163), Jermain Defoe (162), and Michael Owen (150) completed the 10 players in EPL history who have scored 150 or more goals.
