Premier League Season 2024/2025 - Who Will Win the Golden Boot?
Tomorrow, the best league in the world, the English Premier League, finally kicks off the 2024/2025 season. On Friday one match will be played between Manchester United and Fulham, while Saturday will feature six matches, and three matches will conclude the round on Sunday. Reigning champions Manchester City face a tough first match away against Chelsea on Sunday.Manchester City has dominated English football over the past decade, and they are both the reigning champions and favourites to win again this season. Arsenal has finished second in the league two seasons in a row and is the main challenger to City again, and possibly Liverpool could surprise if their coaching change has a positive effect.
But we are not here to predict the outcome of this season regarding champions or teams to be relegated; instead, we will focus on the Golden Boot and list our candidates for the top scorer title in this edition of the EPL.
Ranking of 12 players who Could win the Golden Boot this season
Erling Braut Haaland won the Golden Boot last season with 27 goals, which was nine goals fewer than the scored in his debut season 2022/2023, but he still had a comfortable win with a five-goal margin over the second-highest scorer.Second in the Golden Boot race was Haaland's former teammate Cole Palmer, who switched clubs from Manchester City to Chelsea shortly after the season opener in August last year. At Chelsea, Palmer scored 22 goals, which is actually really impressive considering he primarily is used as an attacking midfielder, and also because Chelsea did not have a great season.
Third in the Golden Boot race was the Swedish star striker Alexander Isak, who scored 21 goals for Newcastle despite having some injury troubles and missing many games.
Anyway, enough about last season, here is our ranking of the players with the best chance of becoming the number on goal scorer in Premier League in the 2024/2025 season.
1. Erling Braut Haaland, Manchester City
It might not be the most exciting pick to choose Erling Braut Haaland as the favourite to win again, but it would be quite naive not to have him as the favourite. He has won the Golden Boot in both of his seasons playing for Manchester City and has done so convincingly. However, it's not entirely certain that he will win this season, as there are a couple of concerns to consider.Firstly, Haaland has had some injury problems over the past year, and although he appears to be a sturdy person, he seems to be somewhat fragile, and it's not impossible that he could miss matches due to minor injuries in the coming 10 months as well.
Secondly, it is worth considering that when a team wins as much as Manchester City has, the players can subconsciously lose a bit of focus. That's why it's important to "shake things up" in the squad with new signings of highly motivated players, and that is something that City has not done ahead of this season. The only signing they've made is the Brazilian Savio from Troyes (played for Girona on loan last season though), but they have also lost the talented Julian Alvarez. It's not certain that this will have a big impact on the team, but it's not impossible that it could.
2. Ollie Watkins, Aston Villa
Aston Villa's Ollie Watkins is a recognized goal-scorer who increases his goal tally year after year. Last season, Watkins scored 19 goals, his best result in the Premier League. The reason we rank him so highly here is not only because it feels like he's getting sharper as a player every season, but also because Aston Villa is a team on the rise.However, there are some concerns for Watkins as well, and what we're thinking of is that Aston Villa will play in the UEFA Champions League after finishing fourth last season. Villa will likely focus heavily on the UCL, at least in the beginning, which could lead to tough matches and/or player rotation, which could affect Watkins goal performance.
3. Mohamed Salah, Liverpool
Mohamed Salah has been on a slight downward trend in his goal-scoring over the past few seasons, and last season it felt like he wasn't entirely happy with his situation in the team, and there were even strong rumours suggesting he was on his way to Saudi Arabia at one point.However, Salah has chosen to stay at the club, and Jürgen Klopp has been replaced by the much less experienced Dutchman Arne Slot on the bench. But Liverpool has been very strong in the pre-season, winning all matches, including against top rivals Arsenal and Manchester United. We believe that if Liverpool starts the season strong in the league as well, Salah could get a fresh start and be a top contender for the Golden Boot.
4. Alexander Isak, Newcastle
Alexander Isak missed seven Premier League matches last season but still scored 21 goals for his Newcastle team. The club had a fairly inconsistent season, where they played some very fine football at times but also went through a few deep slumps with several consecutive losses, but they did finish the season strongly.For Isak to elevate himself further and seriously challenge for the Golden Boot, he will need to improve his goal-scoring even more, and the team will need to become more consistent in their performances. Neither of these is impossible, which could lead to a Golden Boot title, but regardless, we are likely to see Isak high up in the scoring charts.
5. Christopher Nkunku, Chelsea
Christopher Nkunku had most of last season ruined by various injuries, which limited him to just 11 league matches for his new club, either as a substitute or a starter who was substituted out. However, Nkunku has high potential and also seems set to become the team's primary penalty taker, and if he stays free of injuries this might be a very different season for him.Chelsea has been quite poor for two seasons in a row, despite acquiring many expensive players, but they finished last season strongly, and it doesn't seem unlikely that they are starting to get the team back in order. With Nkunku fit, and Chelsea becomes a top team again, he could finish high in the scoring charts, perhaps even winning the Golden Boot.
6. Dominic Solanke, Tottenham
Dominic Solanke has been a reliable goal-scorer for Bournemouth for several seasons now, and last season he scored 19 goals for his club, which was enough to tie for fourth place in the top scorer list. It was only a matter of time before a bigger club would snap him up, and that has now happened as he signed for Tottenham a few days ago for a reported transfer fee of £65 million.Whether Solanke and Tottenham will be a perfect match remains to be seen, but he has the potential to score plenty of goals wherever he plays, and at a club like Tottenham, he will likely get more chances to score than he did at Bournemouth.
7. Bukayo Saka, Arsenal
Arsenal is the top challenger to Manchester City-some even go as far as considering them slight favourites-but despite that, it's only at the seventh spot that we include an Arsenal player. The reason is not that the team has poor offensive players, quite the opposite, but it's almost impossible to predict which of all these offensive talents will score the most goals for the club.Our choice is Bukayo Saka, but it could just as easily be Kai Havertz, Gabriel Jesus, Gabriel Martinelli, or perhaps even Eddie Nketiah who scores the most league goals for the club. The problem for Arsenal, at least from the perspective of producing a top scorer, is that they have too many players who score goals; they don't have a clear "first-goal-scorer." This is, of course, not a problem when it comes to winning matches, but on a list like this, it's to their disadvantage.
Nevertheless, our reason for choosing Saka is that he scored 16 league goals last season, and given his impressive development, it feels like he has the potential for even more goals and perhaps a very high place in the scoring charts.
8. Ivan Toney, Brentford
Ivan Toney was suspended for half of last season due to breaking English betting regulations, and when he returned to the field, he only managed to score 4 goals in 17 matches. This season, he'll be available from the start and can hopefully help Brentford to a much better season than they had in 2023/2024 when they finished in 16th place. If both he and the team can find their form again, Toney could certainly be a player for the top of the scoring charts.
9. Rasmus Højlund, Manchester United
The talented Dane Rasmus Højlund had a tough start to his first season at Manchester United. He began the season injured, and once he was on the pitch, it wasn't until his fifteenth league match that he scored his first league goal, despite being trusted as a starter in most games. Once he got his first goal, he scored seven goals in six matches before hitting another slump, but he finished the season with goals in the last two matches.This season, he also starts injured and will miss at least a few matches at the beginning. He needs to get his goal-scoring going faster once he's back to be in the race, but he has the potential to develop into a consistent goal-scorer for United in the long run.
10. Cole Palmer, Chelsea
It might seem a bit strange that we list last season's runner-up for the Golden Boot title this far down, but the reason is that even though Cole Palmer is an incredibly skilled goal-scorer, there are often limits to how many goals an attacking midfielder can score in a season. It's not impossible that he could reach around 20 goals again this season, but it will probably be difficult for him to improve last season's result.
Follow us
