Do you know what the Golden Boot is?
If you are not a football fan, you may not know what the Golden Boot is. Well, from noncoms we are going to explain it to you so that you know what this term means.
The Golden Boot is a trophy that is awarded every year and since 1968 to the top scorer in the European leagues. Starting in 1997, a weighted point system was established to do so.
The official sponsor of this unique trophy is the well-known sports brand Adidas, which is why the award represents a golden soccer shoe from this brand. In addition, since the weighted points system was established in 1997, the prize is awarded by the European Sports Media.
But How is the winner of the Golden Boot chosen?
Well, the system for choosing the winner of the Golden Boot has changed since its inception. In this article we are going to explain all the details so that you know how it is done. Let’s get started!
What is the classification system to award the Golden Boot?
From 1967 to 1990, the trophy was awarded by the French sports newspaper L’Equipe. The newspaper was in charge of delivering it to the one who had risen as the top scorer in any European league taking into account only the number of goals scored.
The situation changed after 1990, when the second division European teams began to achieve a level of goal scoring as high as the first. In this year, a Cypriot player, who managed to score 40 goals, which was 6 more than those obtained by the winner of the Golden Boot, Dark Pence, that same year, decided to make a complaint to L’Equipe for his form to score and look only at the most powerful leagues. For this reason, L’Equipe decided to eliminate the official nature of the trophy after said protest. From then until 1996, Adidas would be in charge of awarding the prize but without any type of ceremony.
How is the winner of the Golden Boot chosen today?
The situation would change as of 1997, when the European Sports Magazines, the European association of football publications, began to be in charge of awarding the Golden Boot. Thus, this association decided to establish a system of weighted points in which a higher or higher award is given. To a lesser extent the goal depending on the league in which the player competes. The scoring criteria followed to establish the winners are the following:
- 2 points for each goal from the German, Spanish, English, Italian and Portuguese leagues.
- 5 points for every goal in the French, Belgian, Bulgarian, Czech, Austrian, Scottish, Greek, Croatian, Dutch, Norwegian, Israeli, Serbian, Russian, Polish, Ukrainian, Swiss and Turkish leagues.
- 1 point for every goal in the Armenian, Andorran, Albanian, Azerbaijani, Belarusian, Bosnian, Danish, Slovak, Cypriot, Slovenian, Estonian, Finnish, Faroese, Georgian, Welsh, Hungarian, Irish, Icelandic, Kazakh, Latvian, Lithuanian, Luxembourgish, Maltese, Macedonian, Moldavian, Montenegrin, Northern Irish, Romanian and Swedish.
This classification is currently based on the UEFA coefficients of each league, so it can vary relatively each year.
What are the UEFA coefficients of the leagues?
These are the statistics produced periodically by UEFA that are used to assign and order calcifications or privileged positions in draws for teams that participate in those football championships that are organized by UEFA.
There are different types of UEFA coefficients that are awarded to national teams, league championships and clubs. The UEFA coefficient that is assigned to award the Golden Boot is the coefficient of the leagues.
This coefficient is used to order the leagues in Europe. This determines the number of clubs from each league that will play in the Champions League and Europa League.
This coefficient is based on the result of the clubs during the last five seasons, precisely the information used to award the Golden Boot. The number of points earned during five seasons in both leagues is divided by the number of participants in each and in every season. To this amount are added the points corresponding to the last five seasons, points that, in turn, are divided by two. In addition, you can get extra points for different reasons, for example by qualifying for the Champions League final you can get 3 extra points.
Who are the winners of the Golden Boot in recent years?
The winners of the Golden Boot from 2012 to the present are:
Winner of the Golden Boot 2011/2012: Argentine Lionel Messy, with 50 goals and 100 points, belonging to FC Barcelona.
Winner of the Golden Boot 2012/2013: Argentine Lionel Messy, with 46 goals and 92 points, belonging to FC Barcelona.
Winner of the Golden Boot 3013/2014: the Portuguese Cristiano Ronaldo, with 31 goals and 62 points, belonging to Real Madrid C. F and the Uruguayan Luis Suarez with the same score and belonging to Liverpool FC
Winner of the Golden Boot 2014/2015: the Portuguese Cristiano Ronaldo, with 48 goals and 96 points, belonging to Real Madrid CF
Winner of the Golden Boot 2014/2015: Uruguayan Luis Suarez, with 40 goals and 80 points, belonging to FC Barcelona.
