New rule for Euro 2024 could cause first ever Golden Boot result
A rule change for Euro 2024 means that the Golden Boot winner is very much up for grabs, but it could cause a bit of a ruckus.
Football fans will know that a tournament's Golden Boot goes to the player who scored the most goals, and if there's a tie on that front they'll go through a few more criteria until they have a winner.
If top scorers are tied for goals scored it'll become a matter of which contender has the most goals and assists, and if they still can't get a winner from that it comes down to which of them has played the fewest minutes in the competition.
Take the last Euros for example, Cristiano Ronaldo and Patrik Schick were joint top scorers with five goals apiece but Ronaldo took the Golden Boot as he'd registered an assist and Schick hadn't.
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Then there's Euro 2012, where a trio of players were tied as top scorers on three goals before the accolade went to Fernando Torres because he'd played the least between himself, Mario Gómez and Alan Dzagoev.
As it stands there are six players who are tied for top scorer in Euro 2024, including England's Harry Kane.
His tally of three goals puts him alongside Dani Olmo, Jamal Musiala, Cody Gakpo, Ivan Schranz and Georges Mikautadze.
Normally it'd be Olmo getting the Golden Boot as it stands as he has two assists, but thanks to a new rule change for Euro 2024 that could change.
This time around UEFA has said that if there's no clear top scorer at the tournament then all the players will have to share the accolade.
They're not going to slice the trophy up or anything and give each player a chunk, but each of them would be able to call themselves the joint Golden Boot winner for Euro 2024.
Some thought the award should go to 'the guy with the least matches', while plenty complained about the rules for choosing who should win the Golden Boot.
There were a lot of complaints about Ronaldo, a player who scored no goals this time around after winning the Golden Boot last time.
"Why are they changing the rules now that stood for so long?" someone else wondered.
However, there were some folks supporting the change, saying that UEFA had got it 'spot on' as it made the Golden Boot just about goals and nothing else.
Of course, if we're talking about the real top scorer at Euro 2024 that's a chap called 'Own Goals' who's tally is currently at 10.
However, this guy seems to be cheating as he's been playing for all sorts of teams across the tournament.
Topics: Euro 2024, Football, Sport, Harry Kane
Joe Harker