The European Golden Shoe, formerly known as the European Golden Boot, is an association football award presented each season to the leading goalscorer in league matches from the top division of every European national league.
From its inception in the 1967–68 season the award, originally called Soulier d'Or, which translates from French as Golden Shoe or Boot, was given by France Football magazine to the top goalscorer in all European leagues that season. No allowance was made for the relative strengths of those leagues.
Between 1991 and 1996, no award was made. This followed a protest from the Cyprus FA, which claimed that a Cypriot player with 40 goals should have received the award, whereas France Football listed the top scorers for Cyprus for 1990–91 with only 19 goals.[1]
The award was revived for the 1996–97 season, when European Sports Magazines (ESM), of which France Football is a member, decided on a points system weighted according to the relative strength of each of Europe's leagues. The weightings are determined by the league's ranking on the UEFA coefficients, which in turn depend on the results of each league's clubs in European competition over the previous five seasons. Thus goals scored in Serie A, the top Italian football league, will count for more than those scored in the weaker League of Wales, its Welsh equivalent.[2]
As of the 2007–08 season, the current holder of the Golden Shoe is Cristiano Ronaldo of Manchester United, whose 31 goals in the English Premier League gave him 62 points.
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Between 1968 and 1991, the European Golden Boot, as it was then known, was given to the highest goalscorer in any European league. This was regardless of the toughness of the league in which the top scorer played and the number of games in which the player had taken part. During this period Eusébio, Gerd Müller, Dudu Georgescu and Fernando Gomes each won the Golden Boot twice.[2]
Seasons when there were joint winners
The Golden Shoe was made unofficial from 1991 to 1996, following a protest from the Cyprus FA where a player allegedly scored 40 goals, though the official top scorers for the season are both listed with 19 goals. Due to this affair, France Football decided to make the competition unofficial until 1996. The top scorer for the 1990–91 season, Darko Pancev, did not receive his award until 2006.[4] It was reinstated in 1996 with different regulations. The "unofficial" Golden Shoe winners, according to the pre-1991 rules, would have been:
Season | Player | Club | League | Goals | Notes | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1991–92 | SCO | Ally McCoist | Rangers | Scottish Premier Division | 34 | [1][5] |
1992–93 | SCO | Ally McCoist | Rangers | Scottish Premier Division | 34 | [1][5] |
1993–94 | WAL | David Taylor | Porthmadog | League of Wales | 43 | [1] |
1994–95 | ARM | Arsen Avetisyan | Homenetmen | Armenian Premier League | 39 | [1] |
1995–96 | GEO | Zviad Endeladze | Margveti | Georgian Umaglesi Liga | 40 | [1] |
Since the 1996–97 season, European Sports Magazines have awarded the Golden Shoe based on a points system that allows players in tougher leagues to win even if they score fewer goals than a player in a weaker league. With this modification goals are ranked differently between the leagues. Goals scored in the top five leagues according to the UEFA coefficients list are multiplied by a factor of two, and goals scored in the leagues ranked six to 21 are multiplied by 1.5.[1]
Seasons when there were joint winners
Season | Country | Player | Club | League | Goals | Points | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1996–97 | BRA | Ronaldo | Barcelona | Spanish La Liga | 34 | 68 | [1] |
1997–98 | GRE | Nikos Machlas | Vitesse Arnhem | Dutch Eredivisie | 34 | 68 | [1] |
1998–99 | BRA | Mário Jardel | FC Porto | Portuguese Liga | 36 | 72 | [1] |
1999–00 | ENG | Kevin Phillips | Sunderland | English Premier League | 30 | 60 | [6] |
2000–01 | SWE | Henrik Larsson | Celtic | Scottish Premier League | 35 | 52.5 | [7] |
2001–02 | BRA | Mário Jardel | Sporting CP | Portuguese Liga | 42 | 63 | [8] |
2002–03 | NED | Roy Makaay | Deportivo La Coruña | Spanish La Liga | 29 | 58 | [8] |
2003–04 | FRA | Thierry Henry | Arsenal | English Premier League | 30 | 60 | [9] |
2004–05[10] | FRA | Thierry Henry | Arsenal | English Premier League | 25 | 50 | [8] |
2004–05[10] | URU | Diego Forlan | Villarreal | Spanish La Liga | 25 | 50 | [8] |
2005–06 | ITA | Luca Toni | Fiorentina | Italian Serie A | 31 | 62 | [8] |
2006–07 | ITA | Francesco Totti | Roma | Italian Serie A | 26 | 52 | [11] |
2007–08 | POR | Cristiano Ronaldo | Manchester United | English Premier League | 31 | 62 | [12] |
Country | Winners |
---|---|
Portugal | 5 |
Netherlands | 4 |
Romania | 3 |
Brazil | 3 |
Bulgaria | 3 |
Germany | 2 |
Austria | 2 |
France | 2 |
Italy | 2 |
Yugoslavia | 2 |
Argentina | 1 |
Belgium | 1 |
Cyprus | 1 |
England | 1 |
Greece | 1 |
Mexico | 1 |
Sweden | 1 |
Turkey | 1 |
Uruguay | 1 |
Wales | 1 |
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