At the midway point of the Premier League season it is not only the league table that has an unusual look about it. The top scorers’ chart after 19 games sees Everton’s Romelu Lukaku and Jamie Vardy of Leicester leading the way on 15 goals each, closely pursued by Odion Ighalo of Watford. Of the strikers who finished in the top five behind last season’s top scorer, Sergio Agüero, only Tottenham’s Harry Kane features in the current quintet after the decline of Chelsea’s Diego Costa, among others, and the emergence of several new faces. Here is ranking of the 10 best striker in the league this season, based on stats provided by Opta. 1 Romelu Lukaku, Everton The £28m Everton paid to sign the Belgium international from Chelsea raised a few eyebrows on Merseyside at the time but it now looks a very shrewd investment. As well as being joint-top scorer with 15 goals Lukaku has laid on four assists and created a total of 27 chances for his team-mates, forming a burgeoning partnership with Gerard Deulofeu. His mobility and first touch have both improved hugely since arriving at Goodison Park, while the natural finishing ability that saw him end as top scorer in the Belgium league aged 17 has been sharpened to devastating effect. Ed Aarons Goals 15 Minutes per goal 111.6 Shot conversion rate 29.4% Assists 4

2 Jamie Vardy, Leicester His spectacular run of scoring in 11 successive Premier League matches will live long in the memory for all Leicester fans but it still may not be enough for Vardy’s hopes of establishing himself as a regular for England. Roy Hodgson has so far proved reluctant to trust the league’s joint-top scorer with a central role and his miss against Manchester City on Tuesday will not have helped his cause. Yet for a player who has worked his way up from Stocksbridge Park Steels in the Northern Premier League to the very highest level, there is no reason to suggest he cannot continue to confound expectations. EA Goals 15 Minutes per goal 110.9 Shot conversion rate 28.8% Assists 3

3 Odion Ighalo, Watford At the back end of last season Ighalo was not even a guaranteed starter for Watford in the Championship, which makes his blistering start to life in the Premier League all the more remarkable. Nobody has managed more shots than Ighalo this season but a big reason for his success and 14 goals has been his partnership with Troy Deeney in an era when strike duos are thoroughly unfashionable. Deeney, previously very much a centre-forward, has adapted to almost a supporting role, providing the bullets for Ighalo to fire Watford to their current lofty position. Nick Miller Goals 14 Minutes per goal 113.6 Shot conversion rate 25.9% Assists 2

4 Harry Kane, Tottenham After his spectacular breakout season some may have doubted whether Kane could follow that up. After a slow start in which he failed to score until the end of September, the 22-year-old has emphatically answered the sceptics with 11 goals in his last 13 Premier League games and has once more been the focal point of a resurgent Tottenham side who go into 2016 fourth in the table. Three more goals in the Euro 2016 qualifiers have also put Kane at the front of the queue to lead the line for England in the summer, especially in light of Wayne Rooney’s recent travails. EA Goals 11 Minutes per goal 151.6 Shot conversion rate 22% Assists 1

5 Olivier Giroud, Arsenal Questions about whether Giroud is quite good enough for a title-challenging team will probably dog him for the rest of his career but presumably they will not bother him at the moment. has 10 league goals in 13 starts to help the Gunners to the top of the table, with another five in the Champions League, two coming against Bayern Munich. What is perhaps even more impressive is that he has improved his all-round play too, his movement and link-ups with Mesut Özil a key reason for Arsenal’s position as title favourites. If he carries on like this, maybe they will finally deliver on their promise.contd

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