Online Reporter
LONDON. — There seems no stopping Liverpool or Mohamed Salah this season.
The Reds are 11 points clear of Arsenal at the top of the Premier League as they look to become champions for the 20th time. Egypt forward Salah has been integral in that success and again played a starring role with a goal and an assist in Liverpool’s 2-0 win at reigning champions Manchester City on Sunday to continue his incredible form in 2024-25.
But is the 32-year-old on course for the best individual campaign since the Premier League era began in 1992?
We take a look at the stats to see how he compares to other great strikers and what records he could break.
Salah has won the Golden Boot as the league’s top scorer three times (outright in 2017-18 and shared in 2018-19 and 2021-22) and is leading the race this season.
His best campaign featured 32 goals, but he could beat that in the next few months.
He has 25 goals in 27 games — six clear of Newcastle’s Alexander Isak and Manchester City’s Erling Haaland, the player who won the award in the past two seasons.
Haaland’s 36 goals two seasons ago is a Premier League record, although no-one will probably ever pass Dixie Dean’s incredible 60 league goals for Everton in 1927-28.
Only Arsenal’s Thierry Henry has been top scorer in four seasons of the Premier League, while only Jimmy Greaves at Chelsea and Tottenham in the 1950s and 60s (six) and Derby County’s Steve Bloomer in the 1890s and 1900s (five) have been top more often in the English top flight.
In the ‘big five’ leagues (Premier League, La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga and Ligue 1), Salah is again top, four goals ahead of Bayern Munich’s Harry Kane and Atalanta’s Mateo Retegui and five clear of Barcelona’s Robert Lewandowski.
But Salah is more than just a goalscorer.
He is well clear in assists too with 16 — six more than anyone else in the Premier League and five more than Barcelona’s Lamine Yamal, who is next across Europe’s big five leagues.
Salah has 11 games to break the single-season Premier League assists record of 20 shared by Henry in 2002-03 and Manchester City’s Kevin de Bruyne in 2019-20.
When you combine goals with assists, Salah has 41 goal contributions. The Premier League record is 47 — shared by Blackburn’s Alan Shearer and Andrew Cole at Newcastle, although they did that in 42-match campaigns.
In a 38-game season, the best is 44 by Haaland two years ago (36 goals, eight assists) and Henry in 2002-03 (24 goals, 20 assists).
Since 2006-07 only four players in England, Spain, Italy, Germany or France have reached 50 goal contributions in a single season: Barcelona’s Lionel Messi and Real Madrid’s Cristiano Ronaldo (three), Barcelona’s Luis Suarez (one) and Paris St-Germain’s Zlatan Ibrahimovic (one).
Messi’s best league total came in an incredible 2011-12 season with 66 goal contributions (50 goals and 16 assists).
Salah has scored and assisted a goal in 49 league matches in his career in Europe’s big five leagues.
Since Opta has recorded data (from 2006-07), only Messi (102) and Ronaldo (65) have scored and assisted more often. — BBC Sport.
