How the European Golden Shoe race looks without penalties

Cristiano Ronaldo draws blank against Sassuolo in their 3-3 draw on Wednesday evening.

Bayern Munich forward Lewandowski is leading the European Golden Shoe race with 68 points but faces competition from Juventus Cristiano Ronaldo and Lazio’s Ciro Immobile who still has 5 Serie A matches to play.

The Portuguese superstar and Italian international have scored 28 and 29 goals respectively giving them a point of 56 and 58 point.

Cristiano Ronaldo need 6 more goals to be level on point with Lewandowski with Immobile requiring 5 more goals.

But did you know that 11 of Ronaldo’s and Immobile league goals in 2019/20 have come from the penalty spot? That means around 39% of their goals have come from spot kicks.

The above has got us rethink how the race for the European Golden Shoe would look if penalties were removed.

Penalties are welcome in a game and crucial to the success of a team. Messi losing the Copa America on penalties on numerous occasions shows how important penalties her but we just have to remove them and see how the players fare.

We have taken away the penalties from European Golden Boot contenders and then recalculated their points tally to produce the updated standings.

• Robert Lewandowski : 58 points

• Timo Werner : 50 points

• Erling Haaland : 48.5 points

• Shon Weissman : 42 points

• Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Danny Ings : 38 points

• Ciro Immobile, Jamie Vardy, Kylian Mbappe, Patson Daka, Jean-Pierre Nsame : 36 points

• Cristiano Ronaldo, Lionel Messi, Raheem Sterling, Jadon Sancho, Sadio Mane : 34 points

• Mohamed Salah, Anthony Martial : 32 points

This list shows that Robert Lewandowski sits at No.1 with an updated points total of 58. The Polish forward has scored 5 penalties this season, taking 10 points off due to the 2 points for Europe top 5 leagues. He’s still leading his nearest challenger Timo Werner with 8 points.

A look at Southampton Danny Ings who has scored 19 goals this season with none from the penalty spot. This puts him ahead of top names like Ronaldo, Messi, Salah, Mane, Mbappe, Sterling and others.

Ciro Immobile has 58 points with penalties and 36 without penalties. That’s a massive 22 points off.

The same applies to Superstar Ronaldo who has 34 points from a previous 56 points.

It shows how players have benefited from penalties this season.

Do you think penalties should be scrapped in the European Golden boot race?