The Premier League is frequently billed as the best league in the world but that claim is certainly open to question. After all, Real Madrid have been crowned champions of Europe 14 times (as of 2022/23), whilst all English clubs combined have just 15 titles. Moreover, there are no English teams in the semis of the 2023/24 Champions League, nor in the final four of this season’s Europa League.
A more tenable claim is that the Premier League is the richest league on the planet, with few decent arguments to be made against that given its huge global appeal and the massive TV rights deals that has led to. That financial success is in large part down to a third claim that is often made in relation to England’s top flight: that it is the most exciting in the world.
That is harder to verify but in terms of its accuracy probably lies some way between the other two boasts. Part of the excitement is down to the unpredictability of the league, even if Man City are doing their darndest to eliminate that by simply being too good. The fast pace of the game and, certainly in days gone by, its hard, physical – yet fair-spirited – nature were also part of the appeal.
Another factor is goals and they are our focus here. We are not going to compare the Premier League’s goal averages over the years with that of other top European football leagues. Instead, we are turning our gaze solely to the English top flight and looking at what the record for the most goals in any given gameweek is. A “gameweek” is the newish term used to describe a single round of 10 Premier League fixtures, whether those take place on a Tuesday and Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday, or are spread between Friday and Monday.
League High Set in Current Season
The most goals ever recorded in a single round of 10 Premier League matches happened quite recently, in February 2024. That the new benchmark should be set in the 2023/24 campaign is not all that surprising given the new interpretation of the rules around added time.
In the 2023/24 campaign, it has been common to see added time at the end of the first half if five minutes or more, whilst the second half has often seen double-digit injury time. If we estimate that on average there is a total of nine minutes more injury time per game, that is an extra 10% on top of the base minutes. More time played should naturally lead to more goals, especially when we factor in player fatigue and increased urgency at the end of contests.
2023/24 – Matchweek 23 Sees Record 45 Goals Scored
Matchweek, gameweek, round of Premier League games, call it what you will: the record came in the 23rd set of fixtures in the 2023/24 campaign. 45 goals were banged in, beating the previous high by a single goal. That old benchmark came towards the end of last season in matchweek 34 (“matchweek” seems to be official EPL terminology so we’ll stick with that from here on) but had also been achieved previously in the second round of fixtures in the 2020/21 season.
Backing up what we have said about increased added time leading to more goals, the 2023/24 season seems almost certain to be the highest-scoring in Premier League history. And the events at the start of February played a huge part in that.
Things got underway on Saturday the 3rd of February 2024 with the early kick-off at Goodison Park between Everton and Spurs. That one ended 2-2 and amazingly every game later in the day had at least that many goals. Really setting the tone for what was to come, Newcastle and Luton played out an incredible 4-4 draw to add eight to the round’s tally.
Sunday began quietly with a 1-1 draw between Bournemouth and Forrest but the other three games produced a total of 13 goals to put the record within sight. The fixtures would conclude on Monday night, with Man City visiting Brentford. Phil Foden scored a hat-trick in a 3-1 win for the away team and his third goal was the one that set the new record.
- Everton 2-2 Spurs
- Brighton 4-1 Crystal Palace
- Burnley 2-2 Fulham
- Newcastle 4-4 Luton
- Sheffield United 0-5 Aston Villa
- Bournemouth 1-1 Nottingham Forest
- Chelsea 2-4 Wolves
- Man United 3-0 West Ham
- Arsenal 3-1 Liverpool
- Brentford 1-3 Man City
- Total – 45 goals in 10 games
10-Game Record but Not Gameweek High
Whilst much fuss was made about this new high, it was, in fact, well short of the all-time Premier League record for the most goals in any given round of fixtures. Some younger, or simply more forgetful fans, may not have realised that in its earliest days there were 22 teams in the Premier League.
That was the case in 1992/93 when the new rebranded competition began, and the PL only dropped to 20 teams for the start of the 1995/96 campaign. That meant that for a time a standard round of fixtures comprised 11 games, not 10, and if we look back through the record books with a keen eye we can see that the final round of clashes in the inaugural 1992/93 campaign through up some rather exciting results.
Whilst Man United romped to the title, 10 points clear of Aston Villa in the end, the relegation battle went to the wire. In the end, Oldham escaped on goal difference, Crystal Palace going down after they lost 3-0 on the final day and Oldham won 4-3. Incredible drama and, clearly, goals aplenty.
Strangely, given it was the final weekend of the season, nine games took place on Saturday and two on Sunday. All 11 goal-packed games can be seen below.
- Sheffield United 4-2 Chelsea
- Liverpool 6-2 Spurs
- Blackburn 1-0 Sheffield Wednesday
- Ipswich 2-1 Forest
- Coventry 3-3 Leeds
- Oldham 4-3 Southampton
- Arsenal 3-0 Palace
- Middlesbrough 3-3 Norwich
- Man City 2-5 Everton
- QPR 2-1 Aston Villa
- Wimbledon 1-2 Man United
- Total – 53 Goals from 11 Games
So, whilst Foden’s treble set a new record for a 10-match gameweek in the Premier League, it was not the most goals scored in a single round of PL games. What’s more, the goals-per-game was also higher in 1993, at a juicy 4.82 per game compared to 4.50 in 2023/24.