Currently, Cristiano Ronaldo is the player with the most decisive goals in UEFA Champions League history. The Portuguese striker has 140 goals and 42 assists in 187 appearances in the UEFA Champions League. That means he has 182 goal contributions in league history. However, Messi is second on the list with 129 goals and 40 assists in 162 games. The Argentine forward has 13 fewer goals than the Portuguese winger. However, Karim Benzema ranks third on the list with 86 goals and 28 assists in 146 games. In addition to Benzema, Messi and Cristiano Ronlado, Robert Lewandowski is another decisive player with more than 100 goals in UEFA Champions League history. The Polish striker is currently the top scorer in La Liga this season with 91 goals and 22 assists in 111 games.
Thierry Henry, Ruud Van Nistelrooy, Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Neymar, Thomas Muller and Raul are among the other players on the list of the top 10 goalscorers in UEFA Champions League history. These players contributed goals from 67 to 87 and that puts them on the list of the most decisive players in league history.
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Erling Haaland is having an incredible season, but Liverpool know that Luis Suárez and Mohamed Salah have set their sights on pushing the limits in the Premier League, there's still a way to go.
Erling Haaland is on track to break every kind of Premier League record. Most notably, the title of the player with the most goals in a season - currently held by Liverpool star Mohamed Salah - is certainly in the sights of the Manchester City goalscorer. All he has to do is score at a relative pedestrian rate of one goal every two games for the rest of the campaign.
So is this the best season for a Premier League striker? It could still end up like this. But a record of 32 goals alone won't be enough to earn Haaland that title, especially because Liverpool fans remember a truth from Luis Suarez that is all too easily forgotten.
Suarez may have 'only' scored 31 goals in the 2013/14 season but he also has an unbelievable 17 assists. Keeping in mind he missed the first five games of the Premier League season, it's terrifying to think of the numbers he could come up with if he were everywhere - and he still leads. Haaland is in an important area.
Admittedly, Suárez missed the start of this season by being banned for pointlessly biting Branislav Ivanovi?, which of course the Liverpool striker only blamed himself for. It would be irresponsible to write about the Uruguayan without acknowledging his serious flaws, including being banned for racism after the incident with Patrice Evra.
But from a purely football standpoint, the truth is that the Premier League has never seen anything like this season from Suárez, who remains underrated to this day. A comparison with Haaland makes everything clear.
While the Manchester City forward currently scores one non-penalty participation (goal or assist) at a rate of 1.24 per game, Suárez finished the 2013/14 season with an average of 1.3 participations per game (all digits according to FBref). For all the applause for Haaland, he's not nearly as clear on any historical precedent as some would lead you to believe. Sign up for our EXCLUSIVE Liverpool.com newsletter!
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Some will scoff at this point. Goals without penalties and assists? Isn't that an artificial metric? Yeah no, not really.
Haaland doesn't deserve any more credit coming to Manchester City without a clear-cut penalty taker, and Suárez would never have toppled Steven Gerrard at Liverpool. If he conceded and scored all the penalties scored by the captain, he would have ended the season with 42 goals. Excluding them is valid.
As for the inclusion of assists, that seems particularly relevant to the debate over whether Pep Guardiola's side have actually gotten worse since the former Borussia Dortmund hitman was announced. return or not. The best strikers are both providers and scorers.
Which brings us back to Salah. His two goals and two assists against Manchester United are the work of a genius and sum up what he has shown since joining Liverpool. And his first season was just as explosive as Haaland's.
Manchester City's Norwegian striker Erling Haaland (L) and Liverpool's Egyptian striker Mohamed Salah (right) greet each other before the English Premier League football match
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