… Edin Džeko ranks in first place with only 2.74% of his goals coming from penalty kicks
… Cristiano Ronaldo comes in last place with 18.86% of his goals coming from penalty kicks
… Messi beats Ronaldo, as only 11.65% of his goal total is made up of penalty kicks
… Drogba ranks fourth with 6.29% of his goals coming from penalties
Recently the likes of Messi, Ronaldo and Benzema all moved to leagues outside the top five in Europe, leaving fans to prolong the debate of who the G.O.A.T in football is. One of the key arguments is over the number of penalty goals that contribute to their goal tally.
Live Football Tickets sought to find the best goal-scorers of the 21st century, and calculate the percentage of their goals that are penalties so that the debate of the greatest goal-scorers can be settled once and for all.
In first place is Bosnian striker, Edin Džeko whose 328 goals at club level only consist of an impressively low 9 penalty goals (2.74%). Džeko has enjoyed a long career at a variety of top-tier teams such as Manchester City and Inter Milan.
In second place is German striker, Miroslav Klose, who boasts 258 goals at club level, only 11 of which were penalty goals (4.26%). Klose has achieved many trophies throughout his career, most notably a World Cup, leaving most German fans regarding him among the greatest goal-scorers in history.
Rounding off the top three is another German striker, Mario Gómez where only 17 (5.33%) of his 319 goals at club level came from penalties. Gomez has experienced incredible success throughout his footballing career, particularly with Bayern Munich, where he won several league titles and an elusive Champions League trophy.
Cristiano Ronaldo ranks in last place!
The man who many consider the greatest of all time, Cristiano Ronaldo, ranks last. Although the Portuguese superstar has bagged 721 goals at club level, a whopping 136 (18.86%) of these came from penalty kicks. Lionel Messi on the other hand has also scored 721 goals at club level, but only 84 (11.65%) of them came from penalties, which for some could be key in settling the debate of who is better.
Methodology:
1- Live Football Tickets sought to find out the greatest goal scorers of the 21st century based on who had the lowest percentage of penalty kicks.
2- A seed list of 25 of the highest-scoring players of the 21st century was collected using Transfermarkt, Sofascore, Premier League and Fbref.
3 – Utilising transfermarkt, the amount of goals at club level were collected for each player, as well as how many of these goals were penalty goals.
4 – The percentages of penalty goals were calculated for each player and the results were ranked from lowest to highest to determine the players with the lowest percentage of penalty goals.
5 – Date collected 05/09/2023
