EURO stars shining in Golden Shoe race

Several of the players expected to star at UEFA EURO 2008™ are looking in prime form for the June finals as they make the running for this season's ESM Golden Shoe, an award for the leading goalscorer among the European leagues.

Ronaldo top
Leading the table, for which each goal is weighted depending on the strength of the specific national league, is Portugal winger Cristiano Ronaldo. He showed ability in front of goal with eight strikes in qualifying, good enough for fourth overall, and Ronaldo has now struck 21 times in the 2007/08 Premier League for Manchester United FC, putting him two points ahead of Sevilla FC's Brazilian forward Luis Fabiano.

Form players
Klaas-Jan Huntelaar opened his competitive senior international account for the Netherlands in October against Slovenia and has not stopped scoring since, his 26 goals for AFC Ajax leaving him third in the Golden Shoe standings. Spain's Fernando Torres has struck seven times in Liverpool FC's last three league games to take his total to 19 and move up to joint-fourth place, while France starlet Karim Benzema's 17 goals in Olympique Lyonnais colours leave him sixth. Sharing eighth position are two dark horses for UEFA EURO 2008™ selection who are leading the way in Serie A: Juventus forward David Trezeguet, who has fallen out of favour for France, and Genoa CFC's Marco Borriello, fresh from his Italy debut last month against Portugal.

Only the leading five countries (Spain, Italy, Germany, France and England) on the UEFA Ranking have two as their multiplier. This is to emphasise the difference in (international) performance level between the clubs from those countries and those from the other countries.

A player cannot first play in a summer league (eg Norway) and then in a winter league (eg Spain) and combine the points total for each season.

Figures from Voetbal International