Tottenham Hotspur’s resurgence under new boss Ange Postecoglou will encounter a fierce test, as they welcome fellow unbeaten side Liverpool to North London for a mouth-watering Premier League clash.
This fixture also sees two of the Premier League’s best wide forwards do battle, in the form of Spurs captain Son Heung-min and Liverpool’s talisman Mohamed Salah.
Both players have scored a staggering 250 Premier League goals between them, but where do they rank among the best wide players in English football from the past 30 or so years?
Here is our ranking of the best wide players from fifth to first.
5. Sadio Mané
Maybe the most contentious pick on this list, but over his eight seasons in the Premier League, the Senegalese winger was remarkably consistent.
For instance, the forward reached double figures in goals, in all eight of his league campaigns in England, even gaining the league’s Golden Boot in 2018/19, scoring 22 goals. Not just that, he was an integral part of some impressive Southampton and Liverpool sides.
First, he helped Southampton record their two highest ever Premier League finishes, placing 7th and 6th in the 2014/15 and 2015/16 seasons, scoring 10 and 11 league goals in those respective campaigns.
Then, Mané’s game went to another level when he moved to Liverpool in 2016 for £34 million. Under manager Jurgen Klopp, the winger scored 90 goals in 196 Premier League games, collecting every single major club honour available, including a Premier League title in 2020. Mané also won the African Footballer of the Year twice in his time on Merseyside, as well as a second-place finish in the 2022 Ballon D’or rankings.
4. Eden Hazard
Eden Hazard in full flight at Chelsea was a true sight to behold, effortlessly gliding across the pitch and bamboozling bumbling opponents bouncing off his backside as they failed to subdue him. Just ask Francis Coquelin. The Belgian joined Chelsea from Lille in June 2012 for £32 million, and was an instant hit, earning a place in the PFA Team of the Year by the end of his debut season, along with a Europa League winners medal.
From there, Hazard went from strength to strength, first receiving the PFA Young Player of the Year in 2013/14, and then winning the senior mens’ PFA award in 2015 at the end of a season that saw him capture his first Premier League title.
After a disappointing 2015/16 season, he was back to his supreme best the following year, scoring 16 league goals under manager Antonio Conte to earn his second Premier League crown in 2017. He matched this goal tally in his final season as a Blues player, before he departed for Real Madrid for an initial £88 million with another Europa League winners’ medal around his neck.
3. Ryan Giggs
English football’s most successful player, Ryan Giggs’ extensive accolades and 22-year stint in the Premier League with Manchester United are arguably enough in themselves to warrant him a place on this list.
However, Giggs’ brilliance as an out and out winger in his early years should not be overlooked at all, with his skilful, nimble dribbling and bursts of pace helping propel Sir Alex Ferguson’s Manchester United towards Premier League dominance in the 1990s, whilst also earning the Welshman back-to-back PFA Young Player of the Year awards in 1992 and 1993.
He later reinvented himself into a savvy, technically secure central midfielder, which prolonged Giggs’ career at the top level, and eventually earned him the PFA Player of the Year award in 2009, before he retired in 2014, having claimed an incredible total of 13 Premier League titles.
2. Cristiano Ronaldo
What sometimes gets overlooked about Cristiano Ronaldo is that he had the simple task of following England captain and global superstar David Beckham as Manchester United’s legendary number seven when signing from Sporting CP in the summer of 2003.
Therefore, it speaks volumes the Portuguese forward became perhaps the best United player to ever wear that no. 7 shirt. Ronaldo was by no means ordinary in his first few years in Manchester, but once he swapped style for efficiency, there was no looking back.
Ronaldo scored 17 goals in 2006/07 to fire United to the Premier League title, whilst also collecting both the PFA mens’ Player of the Year and the PFA Young Player of the Year. The next season, he then notched an incredible 31 league goals, another Premier League title as well as a Champions League winners’ medal and his first Ballon D’or crown.
He added another Premier League title in 2009, before leaving for Real Madrid that summer for a then record fee of £85 million, where he established his status as one of the game’s greatest ever players. The acrimony which ultimately engulfed his second spell at United after his return in 2021 should not detract from how imperious Ronaldo was at his peak in the Premier League.
1. Mohamed Salah
After just two goals in 13 Premier League appearances for Chelsea, no-one could ever have predicted the seismic impact Mohamed Salah would have back in English football when he returned to the Premier League after his £37 million transfer to Liverpool from Roma in June 2017.
Salah was simply sensational in his first season for the Reds, scoring a record-breaking 32 league goals in 36 games, as he won the PFA Player of the Year, Premier League Golden Boot and fuelled Liverpool’s run to a losing effort in the Champions League final.
A year later, he went one better, winning the Champions League, and another Golden Boot, shared with teammate Sadio Mané, before leading Liverpool to their first league title in 30 years.
What probably distinguishes Salah ahead of Ronaldo is that the Egyptian’s Premier League peak years have lasted been longer than the Portuguese’s first spell at United, as seen with his second PFA Player of the Year, and third Golden Boot after a 23-goal Premier League 2021/22 campaign.
The 31-year-old is showing no signs of slowing down either, becoming the first player in Premier League history to score or assist in 12 consecutive games on two separate occasions after Liverpool’s 3-1 win last Sunday versus West Ham.
