Ranking all the 20+ goal-a-season strikers outside the top six

Will Ford
Danny-Ings-Southampton-F365

Danny Ings scored his 20th Premier League goal of the season in Southampton’s 1-1 draw with Brighton on Thursday evening, to leave him an outside chance of winning the Golden Boot; he’s three behind Jamie Vardy. The rest of the top ten goalscorers in this league campaign all hail from the top six. To be so prolific in a lesser team is no mean feat, and something of a rarity. We have ranked all of the players outside the top six to notch 20+ goals in a Premier League season, by percentage of their team’s goals scored, because we’ve decided that’s a thing…

 

14) JURGEN KLINSMANN – 1994/95

Goals: 20
Team: Tottenham
League position: 7th
Percentage of team’s goals: 30.3%

The man labelled as bringing ‘the dive’ to England was an entertainer first and foremost. 1994/95 was the most prolific of his career, only matched by the preceding campaign with Monaco.

 

13) LUIS SUAREZ – 2012/13

Goals: 24
Team: Liverpool
League position: 7th
Percentage of team’s goals: 33.8%

The storm before the hurricane. Suarez followed his 24 goals in 2012/13 with 31 the next season, as he and Daniel Sturridge brought up a half century between them in glorious Premier League failure.

 

12) MARK VIDUKA – 2002/03

Goals: 20
Team: Leeds
League position: 15th
Percentage of team’s goals: 34.5%

Leeds’ saving grace as it all came crashing down around him. The Whites were relegated the next season, never to return ag…. hang on…

 

11) JAMIE VARDY – 2017/18

Goals: 20
Team: Leicester
League position: 9th
Percentage of team’s goals: 35.7%

He will eclipse his own Premier League personal best if he bags two more goals in the last two fixtures this campaign, and surely the Golden Boot in the process. He was in fourth place in 2017/18, behind Mo Salah, Harry Kane and Sergio Aguero.

 

10) ALAN SHEARER – 1999/00

Goals: 23
Team: Newcastle
League position: 11th
Percentage of team’s goals: 36.5%

A relatively lean season for the Premier League’s greatest ever goalscorer, which is a bit mental really.

 

9) TEDDY SHERINGHAM – 1992/93

Goals: 22
Team: Tottenham
League position: 8th
Percentage of team’s goals: 36.7%

The great man squeezed in a few goals between cigarattes. Particularly in his first four Premier League seasons at Spurs, where he netted 69 times.

 

8) CHRIS SUTTON – 1993/94

Goals: 25
Team: Norwich
League position: 12th
Percentage of team’s goals: 38.5%

The man you now now as an incredibly irritating, opinionated egomaniac used to be quite good at scoring goals. Not that good though, he scored 111 in 357 professional appearances.

 

7) DANNY INGS – 2019/20

Goals: 20
Team: Southampton
League position: 12th
Percentage of team’s goals: 43.5%

What a snip £20million looks now. Goals of all sorts this season, and he’s not finished yet.

 

6) DARREN BENT – 2009/10

Goals: 24
Team: Sunderland
League position: 13th
Percentage of team’s goals: 50.0%

After missing a header Harry Redknapp’s “missus could have scored”, Bent scored loads of goals for Sunderland in 2009/10, including one with the aid of a beach ball.

 

5) ALAN SHEARER – 1995/96

Goals: 31
Team: Blackburn
League position: 7th
Percentage of team’s goals: 50.8%

One of the poorer attempts to retain a Premier League title, but Shearer kept banging the goals in.

 

4) MATT LE TISSIER – 1993/94 

Goals: 25
Team: Southampton
League position: 18th
Percentage of team’s goals: 51.0%

The greatest scorer of great goals, but also a great goalscorer. Almost singlehandedly kept Southampton in the Premier League.

 

3) ANDREW JOHNSON – 2004/05

Goals: 21
Team: Crystal Palace
League position: 18th
Percentage of team’s goals: 51.2%

Luka Milivojevic nearly knocked him off his perch with ten penalties last season, but Johnson’s 11 in the 2004/05 season is still the record. They all count, as they say, but also ulimately counted for nothing as Palace were relegated.

 

2) KEVIN PHILLIPS – 1999/00

Goals: 30
Team: Sunderland
League position: 7th
Percentage of team’s goals: 52.6%

Only Mo Salah (32), Alan Shearer (31), Thierry Henry (31) and Luiz Suarez (31) have scored more goals in a single Premier League season featuring 20 teams. Phillips is the last Englishman to win the European Golden Boot.

 

1) JAMES BEATTIE – 2002/03

Goals: 23
Team: Southampton
League position: 8th
Percentage of team’s goals: 53.5%

The daddy of percentage of team’s goals. An outstanding season earned him a short-lived England call-up, but he didn’t manage to find the net in four attempts for the Three Lions.

 

Will Ford is on Twitter

 

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