Golden Boot: top scorer prediction

Per-player expected tournament goals, computed as E[goals] = share × E[team goals/match] × E[games played]. Share is the player's exponentially time-decayed slice of their nation's international goals since 2022; team goals/match uses the posterior mean λ; games played uses the knockout stage probabilities from the simulation.

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 England

Harry Kane

4.82

expected tournament goals

28% national-team share26 recent goals

🇳🇴 Norway

Erling Haaland

4.42

expected tournament goals

39% national-team share35 recent goals

🇫🇷 France

Kylian Mbappé

4.23

expected tournament goals

24% national-team share27 recent goals

Top 30 expected scorers

#	Player	Team	Goal share	Team xG	xGoals	Recent
4	Lionel Messi	🇦🇷Argentina	19.6%	19.0	3.71	17
5	Cristiano Ronaldo	🇵🇹Portugal	20.6%	17.4	3.59	26
6	Lautaro Martínez	🇦🇷Argentina	17.3%	19.0	3.29	12
7	Raphinha	🇧🇷Brazil	14.8%	20.7	3.06	7
8	Julián Alvarez	🇦🇷Argentina	15.2%	19.0	2.89	11
9	Vinícius Júnior	🇧🇷Brazil	13.9%	20.7	2.88	6
10	Enner Valencia	🇪🇨Ecuador	29.1%	9.8	2.86	10
11	Mohamed Salah	🇪🇬Egypt	42.8%	6.6	2.84	16
12	Mehdi Taremi	🇮🇷Iran	34.7%	8.1	2.80	17
13	Viktor Gyökeres	🇸🇪Sweden	30.6%	9.1	2.77	17
14	Mikel Merino	🇪🇸Spain	11.9%	22.5	2.68	10
15	Mikel Oyarzabal	🇪🇸Spain	11.4%	22.5	2.57	12
16	Luis Díaz	🇨🇴Colombia	17.5%	14.2	2.49	10
17	Cody Gakpo	🇳🇱Netherlands	14.9%	16.5	2.46	18
18	Memphis Depay	🇳🇱Netherlands	14.4%	16.5	2.38	15
19	Florian Wirtz	🇩🇪Germany	12.2%	18.6	2.27	7
20	Mohamed Amoura	🇩🇿Algeria	24.4%	9.1	2.21	10
21	Romelu Lukaku	🇧🇪Belgium	14.4%	14.9	2.15	18
22	Bruno Fernandes	🇵🇹Portugal	12.0%	17.4	2.10	17
23	Kevin De Bruyne	🇧🇪Belgium	14.1%	14.9	2.10	11
24	Andrej Kramarić	🇭🇷Croatia	16.8%	12.3	2.06	16
25	Breel Embolo	🇨🇭Switzerland	15.7%	12.2	1.92	10
26	Marko Arnautović	🇦🇹Austria	19.7%	9.6	1.89	14
27	Jamal Musiala	🇩🇪Germany	9.9%	18.6	1.85	6
28	Eldor Shomurodov	🇺🇿Uzbekistan	32.9%	5.2	1.72	5
29	Brahim Díaz	🇲🇦Morocco	15.1%	10.9	1.65	6
30	Edin Džeko	🇧🇦Bosnia and Herzegovina	28.0%	5.8	1.63	12

Caveats

Baseline estimator only. Point estimates, no per tournament Monte Carlo. Players who retire between their last goal and the WC may still appear; emerging stars (Yamal, Wirtz) are under-weighted because their international scoring history is short. Squad filter and minutes/role adjustment will land once the official 26-man rosters are released (~2026-06-01).