Each season, the best strikers on the continent compete for one of the most prestigious awards in world football: the Golden Boot. However, not all goals are worth the same. Behind the trophy is a scoring system designed to balance merit between the different European leagues.

A system weighted by difficulty level

The Golden Boot is calculated by multiplying the number of goals scored by the difficulty coefficient of the league in which the player competes. In this way, the award not only measures the number of goals, but also the competitiveness of the tournament in which they are scored.

The strongest leagues --LaLiga (Spain), Premier League (England), Bundesliga (Germany), Serie A (Italy) and Ligue 1 (France)-- have a coefficient of two points per goal.

Below that, leagues ranked between sixth and 21st in the UEFA ranking - such as Portugal's Primeira Liga or the Netherlands' Eredivisie - award 1.5 points per goal.

Finally, the rest of the European leagues allocate one point per goal, as they are considered to be of a lower competitive level. The system means that the same number of goals can have very different values depending on the country.

For example:

• A goal in the Premier League is worth 2 points.
• A goal in the Portuguese league is worth 1.5 points.
• A goal in a minor league is worth 1 point.

Tiebreakers

In the event of a tie in the total score, additional criteria are applied: the first is the player's assists, the one with the most assists is placed ahead. Secondly, minutes played are taken into account. If the tie continues, the player who has needed less time to score is imposed. Ultimately, performance in European competitions or winning titles with the club may be considered.

Thanks to this system, the Golden Boot, despite giving special weight to the goals scored, also rewards the quality and competitive context in which they are scored. Thus, the award reflects more fairly who has been the most decisive top scorer in European football each season.