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The contest for the Golden Boot trophy is reaching a fever pitch as the 2025-26 season approaches its midway point.

With a new winner in every one of the last three campaigns, the prize remains wide open. Manchester City star Erling Haaland was the most recent Premier League-based forward to claim the award back in the 2022-23 season.

The prodigious Norwegian striker is back in the hunt this season, but encounters tough competition from Bayern Munich marksman Harry Kane and Spanish La Liga phenomenon Kylian Mbappe. With many games left to play, other players still have time to enter the contest.

What is the Golden Shoe?

The European Golden Shoe was first launched in the 1967-68 by the France-based newspaper L'Equipe to honor the top scorer in domestic league matches from a European top division league.

Since the 1997-98, the award has been administered by European Sports Media, which introduced a weighted scoring system. Under this format, a player's goals are multiplied by a designated coefficient based on the strength ranking of their league.

Goals scored in Europe's five major leagues—the Premier League, La Liga, German Bundesliga, Serie A, and French Ligue 1—are valued at two points each.

For competitions ranked sixth to 22nd in UEFA list, such as the Portuguese league, goals are worth one and a half points. Goals in lower-ranked European leagues are worth one point.

While the award has been shared on several instances in the past, a regulation update from the 2019-20 season dictates that in the case of a tie, the award goes to the player with the fewest minutes played.

If the tie persists, the next deciding factor is the number of league assists, followed by the fewest penalties scored. Only if these criteria are used would the award be split.

Identifying the Leading Contenders?

At present, a three-horse battle is underway for the 2025-26 Golden Shoe, with the three previous winners separated by just a single goal.

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

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

Dutch side Feyenoord striker Ayase Ueda is tied for fifth with 18 goals (27 points) from 17 Eredivisie fixtures this season.

The remainder of the current top ten is comprised of players from leagues that function on a calendar year schedule.

A Look at Previous Recipients

Throughout its nearly six-decade existence, the Golden Shoe has been won by some of football's biggest legends.

Portuguese icon Eusébio won the inaugural trophy in 1968, scoring forty-two goals for Benfica. He later won the award for a second time in the 1972-73 season.

Argentine legend Lionel Messi has secured the most Golden Shoes, claiming the honor on six occasions during his long tenure at FC Barcelona.

Messi set the benchmark for highest tally in a single season with fifty in 2011-12 (100 points). He also became the only player to date 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 proceeding to win it on three further occasions with Real Madrid.

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

The award has seen a new winner in each of the last three seasons.

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

Kylian Mbappe is the current winner of the award after scoring 31 goals (62 points) for Real Madrid in 2024-25.

Now, the very trio are vying at the top of the leaderboard once more this season, with Kane presently leading the pack.