Liverpool’s Mohamed Salah is closing in on several records after a remarkable first season at Anfield in which he’s managed 43 goals in all competitions, just four shy of the club record. But how far can he go before the end of the campaign? How many more records could he smash? Nick Miller looks at a few that might yet withstand his scoring glut.
All-time, single-season, top-flight record: 60 (Dixie Dean, Everton, 1927-28)
Some records can be broken. Some will be broken and some won’t; you suspect that William “Dixie” Dean’s record of goals in a single English top-flight season is one of them. This is the ultimate outlier: The next highest figure is 49 (Tom “Pongo” Waring for Aston Villa in 1931) and 60 is a perfectly respectable total for a whole team to score over a season.
Dean managed seven hat-tricks (including one four-goal game and one five) in 1927-28, was responsible for all Everton’s goals in 14 different games and scored his 60th, beating the previous record of 59 (albeit in the Second Divison) set by Middlesbrough’s George Camsell the previous year, in the last 10 minutes of the season. “Football is a team game,” said Dean after the last game. No need for modesty here, Dixie.
Post-war, single-season, top-flight record: 41 (Jimmy Greaves, Chelsea, 1960-61)
What’s perhaps even more remarkable about the 41 league goals Jimmy Greaves scored for Chelsea in 1960-61 is that he managed them while trying to leave he club. The promise of riches abroad had turned his head, in the era of the maximum wage in England, and he would go on to depart for Milan at the end of the campaign. But in between he managed 41 goals, which was only the start of his record setting: His total was and remains a club record. He scored six hat-tricks and also became the youngest player to reach 100 league goals at the age of 21.
Liverpool, all competitions, single-season record: 47 (Ian Rush, Liverpool, 1983-84)
They fall for players at Liverpool. They’re falling for Salah right now and they fell for a few others like Ian Rush. In 1983-84, Rush set Liverpool’s all-time scoring record, bagging 49 in total (32 in the league), was the PFA Player of the Year, became the first British player to win the European Golden Boot and capped it off with the league title and the European Cup.
“It was great playing with Kenny [Dalglish] because we just jelled,” said Rush about that season. “It was almost telepathic. Sometimes you’d take it for granted playing alongside him because he created so many chances and I just scored the goals.”
Liverpool, league, single-season record: 41 (Roger Hunt, Liverpool, 1961-62)
It’s hard to imagine Liverpool being in the second tier, but after they were allowed to decay in the late 1950s and before Bill Shankly arrived that’s where they were. This isn’t to say they didn’t have some brilliant players, with Roger Hunt being one of them.
Hunt is perhaps a little underrated in the history of Liverpool, given how many superstars came after him, although he does still hold the record for most league goals scored in a season. His 41 in 1961-62 were scored in 41 Second Division games, as Liverpool cruised to promotion, winning the division by eight points, in the days of two points for a win.
Debut Premier League season record: 34 (Andy Cole, Newcastle United, 1993-94)
“If everyone gives him a chance, Andy Cole could be the answer to our dreams in this country,” said Kevin Keegan in the summer of 1993. That didn’t quite turn out to be right, but his first season in the Premier League was certainly pretty dreamy.
Cole, who helped Newcastle win promotion the previous season after arriving from Bristol City, scored 34 goals in 40 starts, forming an almost telepathic partnership with Peter Beardsley. They finished third but that was as good as things got for Cole and Newcastle: He was sold to Manchester United in February of 1995.
Joint Premier League single-season record: 34 (Alan Shearer, Blackburn Rovers, 1994-95)
Sharing the Premier League single-season record with Cole is Alan Shearer. Of course. Salah still has a way to go before matching Shearer’s all-time total of 260 Premier League goals, but then again he’s only been around for a year. Let’s give him some time.
Shearer scored 34 in the 1994-95 season as Blackburn pipped Manchester United to the Premier League title. That team is remembered for having a feared striking partnership, but it was a reasonably one-sided duo: Chris Sutton’s total of 15 league goals was respectable but the key scoring figure, in this season and the Premier League as a whole, was Shearer.
Record for “foreign” players in a season: 31 (Cristiano Ronaldo, Man United, 2007-08 and Luis Suarez, Liverpool, 2013-14)
Here’s one that Salah already had in the bag: the English top-flight record for players from outside the British Isles. Ronaldo got his mark of 31 in his penultimate season in England, when the only things more frequent than the sight of him finding the net were transfer stories insisting he was off to Real Madrid. Suarez scored his when Liverpool sailed so very close to winning the title, while his total was made even more impressive considering he missed the first five games of the season.
One common factor is that both men went on to greater things away from the Premier League. But Liverpool fans won’t be thinking about that too much now. Trying not to, at least.
Nick Miller is a writer for ESPN FC, covering Premier League and European football. Follow him on Twitter @NickMiller79.
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