Three in a row, and a record within reach
Khadija Shaw has won the Women’s Super League Golden Boot three seasons running, the first player in the competition’s history to manage it. Her 21 goals in 2025-26 finished one short of the single-season record shared by Vivianne Miedema (22 in 2018-19) and Rachel Daly (22 in 2022-23). Opta Analyst laid out the 2026-27 race days ago, and the number that frames it is 83.5: Shaw’s minutes per WSL goal, the best rate anyone has managed with at least 500 minutes played.
She starts the season on 83 league goals, behind only Miedema (97) and Bethany England (89). Her career finishing sits 18.4 goals above the 64.6 expected goals her chances have been worth. Thirty-one of those goals came with her head, more than any player in WSL history, and she won 81 aerial duels last season, also a league high. In March she scored the fastest hat-trick the division has seen, three goals in 12 minutes and 37 seconds against Tottenham.
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Russo has done it before
Alessia Russo shared the award with Shaw in 2024-25 on 12 goals each, then finished second last season with 13. Since the start of 2022-23 only Shaw (74) has scored more WSL goals than Russo (47).
What changed last year was where Russo did her damage. She scored nine Champions League goals in 993 minutes, second in that competition behind Ewa Pajor, against 13 league goals in 1,832 minutes. She spent 37% of her European minutes as a central attacking midfielder compared with 24% in the WSL, and the extra freedom lifted her output rather than diluting it.
The outsiders arriving with numbers
Kirsty Hanson scored 12 goals last season, close to 43% of Aston Villa’s league total, from chances worth 6.75 expected goals. She has since moved to Tottenham. Four of those goals came on fast breaks and she led the WSL for goal-ending carries (6) and shot-ending carries (19).
Kadidiatou Diani joins London City Lionesses averaging 0.6 goals per 90 across her Lyon years, with 35 Premiere Ligue goal involvements since August 2023. Olivia Holdt turned 3.8 expected goals into eight for Spurs. Alyssa Thompson scored seven in her first Chelsea season, a total beaten by only three non-European players debuting in the WSL.
The field is deeper than it has been. The benchmark has not moved.
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