There isn’t a single position on the football pitch that receives as much attention as the striker position, It is the marquee position, because there’s a school of thought that every great team needs a great player who can finish off the goals.
Although Real Madrid have won a Champions League title in recent years without a true No. 9 and Manchester City have won the Premier League without one, those are exceptions to the rule.
Because Real Madrid have also dropped Champions League titles without a true top goal-scorer, while Manchester City only became Champions League winners after they added Erling Haaland, a record-breaking striker.
Ahead of the 2025/26 Champions League season, which will officially begin next month with the league phase, let’s do an intial power ranking of the top 12 strikers in the competition.
12. Jonathan David, Juventus
Maybe Dusan Vlahovic can get his career back on track in a contract year, and he did score a goal on Matchday 1 against Parma. But the first goal-scorer and the real starting striker was new free agent signing Jonathan David, and it is more likely that Vlahovic will take a backseat to the Canadian international this season.
David has been one of the most consistent No. 9’s in European football since breaking out at Lille, becoming a much more well-rounded striker during the 2022/23 season and makign good on the raw talent and the initially inflated transfer links.
It’s a bit of a great irony that David only left Lille as a free agent despite breaking out, and it’s almost as if people were hyping him more when he was a raw product.
With his strength, athleticism, and graduated enthusiasm for bringing others into play, David actually looks like the striker Juventus have been longing for since 90 million euro man Gonzalo Higuain’s abrupt decline.
11. Julian Alvarez, Atletico Madrid
Although Julian Alvarez isn’t a true No. 9 – Alexander Sorloth is more of a fox in the box for Atletico Madrid – there is no doubt that with Antoine Griezmann’s quiet decline, Alvarez is the new man who has to take the reigns in the Atleti attack.
Diego Simeone has to place a lot of trust in Alvarez, and while there have already been rumors of transfer unrest just one year after he joined Atletico Madrid after a shock move from Manchester City, it’s impossible envisioning the Argentinian international leaving any time soon.
Alvarez is a dead-eye finisher with brilliant instincts off the ball, and his ability to kill teams on the counter with efficiency and take his chances make him an ideal fit for how Los Rojiblancos play. This could be a big year for him.
10. Hugo Ekitike, Liverpool
Hugo Ekitike isn’t the crown jewel of the Liverpool summer transfer class, and he could yet be overshadowed by the signing of Alexander Isak if Newcastle finally relent and grant the Swedish international his wish to join the Reds.
For now, though, Ekitike is the main man and the replacement for Darwin Nunez. With a couple of goals already to the good, Ekitike is showing that in an attack with Florian Wirtz, Cody Gakpo, and Mohammed Salah, among others, he can score even more goals than the 15 he bagged in a breakout 2024/25 season with Eintracht Frankfurt.
Like most strikers Liverpool prefer to sign, Ekitike has a really nifty all-around game, owing to his understated creativity and his brilliant athleticism, He is silky smooth on and off the ball, and he has always been a special talent, dating back to his forgotten days with Stade de Reims before that failed transfer to Paris.
9. Romelu Lukaku, Napoli
Big Rom still has it, and, if anything, he’s become criminally underrated. While Scott McTominay lapped up all the praise as the Serie A MVP, Romelu Lukaku was just as crucial in yet another Scudetto-winning season for him as an all-important player for a new champion.
Lukaku was there in the final third whenever Napoli needed him, scoring 14 goals and 10 assists on a team that had very little end product for a Serie A champion. He elevated the Partenopei to the nth degree in the second half of the season during the title charge, even though Napoli sold Khvicha Kvaratskhelia after already dumping off former Capocannoniere winner Victor Osimhen to Galatasaray.
Now, Lukaku is out for the first few months of the 2025/26 season due to injury, but that doesn’t change the fact that the big Belgian is one of the best No. 9’s in teh world.
Because of personal agendas, Lukaku is easy to disrespect, and the way he left Inter Milan at the altar twice doesn’t sit right with everyone. Nor was he exactly endearing in his second stint at Chelsea.
However, on the pitch, Lukaku is an all-around maestro and functions as a coach on the field for Antonio Conte. The Italian manager is one of the strictest around, and there’s a reason why he trusts Lukaku so much.
8. Marcus Thuram, Inter Milan
Inter Milan star Marcus Thuram has more than adequately filled the shoes of Romelu Lukaku, and although Lukaku had more assists and as many goals as Thuram last season, that’s also down to the fact that Thuram has to do even more of the “dirty work” in the Inter Milan system.
Thuram sacrifices so much of his own stats for the team’s defensive structure and for Lautaro Martinez, but his ability to transcend the big games and score great goals against the run of play are matchwinning traits.
Look no further than the monsterclass Thuram delivered in the Champions League semifinals last year against Barcelona through both legs. The man is such an understated icon in the Champions League that he was even taking it to Real Madrid while starting as a No. 9 for Borussia Monchengladbach back in 2020/21.
Thuram is one of the best all-around strikers in the business. He defends, draws fouls, carries possession, creates, and then scores when it’s down to him to do so. He deserves more love.
7. Serhou Guirassy, Dortmund
For my money, Serhou Guirassy is one of the most underrated players in world football, and even the move to Dortmund from Stuttgart, where he saved Die Schwaben from relegation and then truly broke out to lead them to Champions League football, hasn’t brought more spotlight on the Guinean international.
Dortmund would be dead in the water without Guirassy, whose individual brilliance against St. Pauli on Matchday 1 with a goal and a created penalty out of nowhere exemplified how much he carries this team.
Guirassy is a unique athlete, incredibly flexible off the ball, a real killer at sniffing out chances, one of the world’s best finishers, and additionally criminally underrated at creating chances. There are few strikers on this list who are more important to his specific team than Guirassy.
6. Alexander Isak, Newcastle
For now, Alexander Isak is a Newcastle striker, and although he can be moody and mercurial with not much to offer besides his goal-scoring abilities, the 25-year-old is a natural-born scorer and a scary talent.
When Isak is motivated, he can win games against any opponent and carry a team on his back. He did it few and far between back as a youngster with Real Sociedad, and now as he enters his prime with Newcastle, he’s doing it on a more consistent basis.
Newcastle don’t make the Champions League next season without Isak’s fine work last year. He was the best striker in the Premier League, even above Erling Haaland, and that says everything about him.
On back-to-back 20-goals seasons in England for Newcastle, Isak is an automatic finisher whose near-post scorchers and long-range dipping shots are an absolute joy to watch.
5. Robert Lewandowski, Barcelona
The top five begins with Robert Lewandowski, who is the most proven striker in world football. He’s reminded fans around the world of his all-around class and longevity at Barcelona, upgrading the team significantly from sudden also-rans back into European powerhouses.
It’s no coincidence that Barcelona have returned to the summit of Spanish football twice since Lewa’s move to Barca, as he’s been a success under two different coaches and two different systems, though, of course, he had already conquered Europe and the stat sheets with Hansi Flick at Bayern Munich.
Lewandoski is an easy man to hate out of envy, but anyone honest will tell you that he is a generational player and that what he is doing at the age of 37 for one of the two biggest clubs in the world is remarkable.
4. Lautaro Martinez, Inter Milan
Always in the conversation but never among the favorites for the Ballon d’Or, Lautaro Martinez is just missing that extra bit of “oomph” he needs to be considered one of the top three strikers in the world.
A lot of that comes down to consistency, because there are some entire stretches of games and even months where the well runs dry and Martinez isn’t producing to his usual level.
But the thing about Lautaro is that he’s so good all-around and such a hard worker for Inter Milan, fitting their ethos perfectly, that he’s still valuable even when he’s not scoring goals.
That’s the mark of a great striker. Lautaro has a wonderful striker partner next to him in Marcus Thuram, but there’s no mistaking the fact that the Argentinian international is THE superstar on Inter Milan, who have made two Champions League Finals in the last three years with him as their main attacking threat.
3. Erling Haaland, Manchester City
Erling Haaland is so good that his 22 Premier League goals last season are considered a disappointment, and there are people already claiming that Alexander Isak is a better striker than him after just one season.
But let’s not forget, Haaland led Manchester City to the treble in his first season with them after joining from Borussia Dortmund, and he has the record for most Premier League goals in a season with 36. And oh by the way, he had eight assists that year, too.
Haaland is so good that he’s considered a disappointment in the same season he scored eight Champions League goals in nine games. The Norwegian international was very much not the problem for Manchester City, as he was still scoring goals and playing well at striker on a team with an aging and dysfunctional midfield that was completely lost after Ballon d’Or winner Rodri’s torn ACL.
There is no doubt that Haaland is the best pure goal-scorer on the planet right now, and he hasn’t ceded that title since earning it as a first-year Manchester City player. In the prime of his career at 25, Haaland is a great bet to cook up a special bounce back season.
2. Harry Kane, Bayern Munich
But if he was ever truly the best striker in the world, that may have only been for one season in 2022/23, taking the mantle from Real Madrid legend Karim Benzema. Even then, Harry Kane had 30 goals, 1.5 key passes per game, and 2.6 completed dribbles and fouls drawn per game that season on a completely dysfunctional Tottenham team that was so bad they 1) only gave Kane three assists despite those numbers and 2) missed out on European football anyway.
Kane had 36 goals and 8 assists of his own in the 2023/24 season as a first-year Bayern Munich star, spoiled by Bayer Leverkusen’s unprecedented undefeated season. And once again, Kane was left to handle the memes after carrying a highly disappointing team for a second year running.
Well, with Michael Olise as his sidekick, Kane finally got a taste of league title glory in 2024/25 with the Bavarian giants, scoring 26 goals with 8 assists in another solid all-around league season while quietly smashing 11 goals in 13 Champions League games.
Kane is the benchmark for all-around excellence at the striker position, and anyone who doesn’t give him his flowers at this point is pretty much delusional beyond hope.
1. Kylian Mbappe, Real Madrid
Yet by the slightest of margins, Kylian Mbappe, the European Golden Boot winner, comes out on top as the best striker in the world heading into the 2025/26 Champions League season.
Honestly, Kane is the more unselfish, well-rounded, and experienced striker. He is better at dropping deep and creating, and he’s also a more pure finisher than Mbappe.
But Mbappe is more explosive, has more upside as he learns the position, and is more statistically brilliant. He was still the European Golden Boot last season despite playing on a transitioning Real Madrid team that was dysfunctional, and while you could blame some of that on Mbappe, the reality is that Madrid would have been in big trouble without him. You can’t blame Mbappe for how badly Vinicius Junior and Rodrygo Goes regressed, or how out of touch Carlo Ancelotti’s coaching became.
Mbappe has defenders on skates. He scores gorgeous goals with his curlers from the channel, scorchers from the middle outside the box, and deft first touches. He is the most uniquely talented goal-scoring weapon in the world, and for as much as we harp on his obvious flaws, his even more obvious talents shine through ten-fold.
The Frenchman is already off to a blazing star this season with three decisive La Liga goals in two matches, cementing the fact that he is more of a solution than a problem for Real Madrid.
Joe Soriano is the editor of The Trivela Effect and a FanSided Hall of Famer who has covered world football since 2011. He’s led top digital communities like The Real Champs (Real Madrid) and has contributed to sites covering Tottenham, Liverpool, Juventus, and Schalke. Joe’s work has appeared in ESPN, Bleacher Report, and Sports Illustrated. He also helped manage NFL Spin Zone and Daily DDT, covering the NFL and pro wrestling, respectively.