Best Strikers in the World in 2023

No acrobatic save, no sacrificing last-ditch tackle, and no eye-spinning dribble can make a football arena explode as much as the ball hitting the net! Goalscorers are still football’s royalty. Hence, the best strikers in the world in 2023 are in a stardom league of their own.

Of course, it’s going to be a controversial topic, yet the best thing about the Golden Boot and general talk about top strikers is that numbers tell a story here. Of course, football’s history is filled with players who did it for just one season only to fall off the next. Here, we’re focusing on the best strikers in 2023, but with their career efforts also playing a part in the final rankings.

#10 best striker in the world: Antoine Griezmann (Atletico Madrid)

Beating out the likes of Romelu Lukaku and Dusan Vlahovic who had quieter 2022/2023 seasons, Antoine Griezmann is enjoying a resurgence in his career. A versatile player as they come, makes it so that considering him as a striker isn't as common. Yet, Griezmann is a goalscorer to say the least, bagging 16 goals in 48 games of the 2022/2023 season. Adding to his tally with 19 goals. Of course, scoring or assisting is not all that strikers have to do now, and Griezmann is the perfect player to illustrate that as he is known for his commitment to pressing and doing the "ugly" parts as well.

#9 best striker in the world: Lautaro Martínez (Inter)

Even though he was criticized and doubted for the longest time, Lautaro Martinez continued on trucking and finally reached the destination - belonging to the select group of the best strikers in the world. The Argentinian scored 28 goals in 57 games he played across the 2022/2023 campaign, recording 11 assists too. Inter reached the CL finals and LAutaro won the World Cup as well, so it's hard to argue with his biography now. The still-young Argentinian started the 2023/2024 season even better, scoring 11 goals in the first 10 games, and recording a poker in a single match as well.

#8 best striker in the world: Victor Osimhen (Napoli)

Victor Osimhen led Napoli to a long-awaited Scudetto with 26 Serie A goals in 32 matches, alongside five assists. Becoming the top scorer of the league. He was efficient in the Champions League as well, with five goals in six matches. The 24-year-old is showing the ever-important consistency with six goals in 10 matches at the start of the new campaign. A trait that all of the best strikers in the world have, Osimhen has produced for his country of Nigeria too, scoring 20 goals in 27 matches.

#7 best striker in the world: Karim Benzema (Al-Ittihad)

Quickly becoming an afterthought since moving away from Europe to Saudi Arabia, yet Karim Benzema was the 2022 Ballon d'Or winner and had a quite successful 2022/2023 season. The 35-year-old scored 31 goals in 43 matches and made six assists. Benz earned his spot on the list of the world's best strikers overall due to his flexibility, because he was his team's primary scorer, then transitioned to be a worker suiting a different goalscorer, and later reverted to the finisher role again. His lack of consistent involvement with the France international team hampers his claim for a higher ranking on the list of best strikers.

#6 best striker in the world: Leo Messi (Inter Miami)

We're not putting Leo Messi underneath all these remaining best strikers in the world, relax. He can now comfortably be called the best player to do it, yet the reality is that he isn't confined to the centre-forward position. He might be a team's primary goalscorer, often placed at the tip of the spear, yet he starts many games on the right wing. The 2022/2023 Ligue 1 season saw Leo Messi return 16 goals and 16 assists in 32 matches! Overall, he bagged 32 goals and 25 assists in 54 matches for PSG and Inter Miami. Not to mention winning the World Cup at the end of 2022.

#5 best striker in the world: Cristiano Ronaldo (Al-Nassr)

Even though he’s nearing a year outside of Europe, Cristiano Ronaldo’s accolades didn’t stop and the Portuguese scored 25 goals in 30 matches with eight assists too. While one might clamour “it’s the Saudi league”, the reality is that that division now has five times more known players than Eredivisie has for the average fan. CR7 has been going strong in the international waters, scoring nine goals in 2023 alone. In the calendar year, he has 40 goals and no one is above him globally! He also became the first player to reach at least 100 goals in three different decades: 206 in the 2000s, 550 in the 2010s, and 102 so far in the 2020s.

#4 best striker in the world: Robert Lewandowski (Barcelona)

For two years Robert Lewandowski was not just the best striker in the world, he was the best player in the world. In his first season with Barcelona, the Polish sharpshooter didn’t flinch and scored 23 league goals alongside seven assists, in 34 matches. Winning the Pichichi trophy for La Liga’s best marksman. Overall, the 35-year-old scored 33 goals in 46 games, with eight assists. The 2023/2024 campaign started well too with six goals and four assists in the first 10 matches. With the meticulous approach to his recovery, RL9 is bound to stay amongst the world’s top 10 and possibly even top five strikers.

#3 best striker in the world: Harry Kane (Bayern Munich)

Finally, Harry Kane made his switch away from Tottenham in a quest to equate his team successes with his individual quality. Aged 30, Kane is hungry for trophies and the start of the German saga started off perfectly with nine goals in 10 games, alongside five assists. All after bagging in 32 goals for THFC in 49 games of the previous seasons, with only five assists after two seasons in which he excelled in that stat line as well. Kane could be the most well-rounded striker there is now in the game, and with Bayern Munich behind him, he could make the #1 spot in the future.

#2 best striker in the world: Kylian Mbappe (Paris Saint-Germain)

There are conversations on whether Mbappe can be regarded as a pure striker, and truly he has been playing mostly on the left wing in the new Paris Saint-Germain season which saw him score eight in nine. Yet, in the previous, 2022/2023 campaign, the 24-year-old scored 41 goals in 43 matches, where he played mostly as a centre-forward. With 10 assists in that club campaign, MBappe showed amazing consistency again. Not to mention reaching the World Cup finals with France, scoring three in the finals, and playing as a striker there.

#1 best striker in the world: Erling Haaland (Manchester City)

The golden standard, and we're not talking about his hair. Erling Haaland has took Europe by storm and then the 23-year-old excelled in his first season with Manchester City - scoring 52 goals in 53 games, and registering nine assists as well. Finally enabling City to reach European glory. Erling was both the Champions League and the Premier League top scorer in his debut year with the City squad! The ever-hungry Norweigan scored eight in his first eight PL games of the sophomore season. Even his record with the international side is wildly impressive - 27 goals in 28 matches.