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The competition for the prestigious Golden Shoe is heating up as the 2025-26 season passes its halfway mark.

With a new winner in every one of the last three campaigns, the prize remains highly contested. Manchester City star Erling Haaland was the last Premier League-based striker to claim the trophy back in 2022-23.

The prolific Norwegian goal-scorer is once again in the hunt this campaign, but encounters tough competition from German Bundesliga marksman Harry Kane and Spanish La Liga superstar Kylian Mbappe. With many games remaining, other talents still have time to enter the contest.

Understanding the Golden Shoe?

The Golden Boot award was first launched in the 1967-68 season by the France-based publication L'Equipe to recognize the leading goalscorer in domestic league matches from a European top division league.

Since the 1997-98 season, the prize has been overseen by European Sports Media, which introduced a points-based points system. Under this method, a player's tallies are multiplied by a designated coefficient based on the UEFA coefficient of their league.

Goals scored in the continent's five major leagues—the Premier League, Spanish La Liga, Bundesliga, Italian Serie A, and Ligue 1—are worth two points apiece.

For leagues ranked from sixth to twenty-second in UEFA's list, such as the Portuguese league, goals are worth one and a half points. Goals in all other European leagues are worth one point.

While the honor has been shared on multiple occasions in the past, a regulation update from the 2019-20 states that in the case of a tie, the award goes to the player with the fewest minutes played.

If the deadlock remains, the subsequent deciding factor is the number of assists, followed by the fewest goals from the penalty spot. Only if these tiebreakers are exhausted would the prize be shared.

Identifying the Leading Challengers?

Currently, a three-way tussle exists for the 2025-26 Golden Shoe, with the trio of previous winners split by just a solitary goal.

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

In fourth is RFS striker Darko Lemajic of Latvia's side RFS, who has netted 28 goals (28 points) across their 36 league games in 2025.

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

The rest of the top 10 is comprised of players from leagues that operate on a calendar year schedule.

A Look at Previous Winners

Throughout its 59-year history, the Golden Shoe has been won by some of football's most iconic stars.

Portuguese legend Eusebio claimed the inaugural trophy in 1968, scoring 42 goals for SL Benfica. He later won the award for a second time in the 1972-73 season.

Argentine legend Lionel Messi has won the most Golden Shoes, claiming the award on six separate times during his long spell at FC Barcelona.

Messi established the benchmark for highest tally in a campaign with 50 in 2011-12 (100 points). He also became the first and only player to date to win it in three successive seasons from 2016-17 to 2018-19.

Portuguese megastar Cristiano Ronaldo first won award in the 2007-08 with Manchester United before going on to win it three more times with Real Madrid.

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

The prize has seen a different winner in each of the past three seasons.

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

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

Now, the same three players are vying at the summit of the standings again this season, with Kane presently out in front the way.