The Home Nations – England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland – have churned out some seriously special footballers down the years.
This time, we focus on the sharp end of the pitch and the top attacking talents produced by these four countries.
These are the best British attackers ever...
Still the youngest player ever to appear at the World Cup – breaking Pele’s record when he starred in Northern Ireland’s shock win over hosts Spain in 1982 aged 17 years and 41 days – Norman Whiteside was the archetypal wonderkid.
A midfielder by trade but adept at centre-forward, Whiteside scored more than 60 goals for Manchester United and helped them to two FA Cup triumphs. He spent a short period with Everton but had to retire aged just 26 due to persistent knee problems.
A prolific scorer for Sunderland and Arsenal – winning the 1912/13 First Division title and finishing as 1922/23 top-flight leading marksman with the former – Charlie Buchan amassed the best part of 300 career goals.
The striker netted four times in six England caps and also played Minor Counties Championship cricket for Durham.
George Camsell’s second-tier record of 59 goals in the 1926/27 campaign will probably never be bettered – and he scored his fair share at the highest level, too.
Among the top scorers of the pre-Premier League era, registering 233 times in the top flight, the legendary Middlesbrough frontman averaged a scarcely fathomable two goals per game in his nine England caps.
Simply one of the most clinical strikers in Premier League history, Andy Cole made the net ripple almost 200 times across his long career in the competition.
Golden Boot winner and PFA Young Player of the Year at Newcastle in 1993/94, ‘Cole the Goal’ joined Alex Ferguson’s Manchester United in a British-record move in 1995, going on to form a formidable partnership with Dwight Yorke and do the 1998/99 treble.
The first England player to win the World Cup Golden Boot, Gary Lineker was in his prime when he topped the goalscoring charts at Mexico ’86 – an especially impressive feat considering the Three Lions exited at the quarter-final stage.
An instinctive poacher, the future Match of the Day presenter – who netted 48 times in 80 international outings overall – finished as First Division top scorer on three occasions and lifted the 1990/91 FA Cup with Tottenham.
A versatile and individualistic forward who could always be relied upon to leave nothing on the pitch, Manchester United and Wales great Mark Hughes was the first double winner of the PFA Young Player of the Year award.
The scorer of almost 250 goals for club and country, ‘Sparky’ claimed numerous major trophies with United and Chelsea – including the Cup Winners’ Cup with both.
Known as Welsh football’s ‘Golden Boy’, Ivor Allchurch was one of his nation’s biggest stars of the mid-20th century.
Starting out with local club Swansea Town (later City), the iconic inside forward banged in the goals for fun and secured a big move to Newcastle after the 1958 World Cup – a tournament at which he struck twice to help the Welsh reach the quarter-finals.
A history maker in 1953 when he became the first player to hit a hat-trick in the FA Cup final – a feat somewhat (unfairly) diminished by the awe-inspiring brilliance of Blackpool teammate Stanley Matthews – Stan Mortensen was among the finest centre-forwards of his era.
Capped 25 times by England, scoring 23 goals, Mortensen actually turned out as an emergency player for Wales during a wartime match against the Three Lions.
On the relatively short list of players to feature for Manchester United and Manchester City over the years, Welsh wizard Billy Meredith was one of the game’s earliest superstars.
A sublime outside forward who won the FA Cup with both Manchester clubs and two First Division titles with United, Meredith helped Wales to British Home Championship success in 1907 and 1920.
Undoubtedly one of Celtic’s greatest-ever players, Stevie Chalmers wrote his name into the history books by notching the decisive goal in the 1967 European Cup final triumph over Inter – as the Old Firm giants became the first British winners of the competition.
An accomplished centre-forward who was on target well over 200 times over the course of his career, Chalmers helped Celtic to four Scottish top-flight titles.
England’s hat-trick hero en route to victory over West Germany in the 1966 World Cup final – and the only player to register three times in that showpiece game until Kylian Mbappe in 2022 – Geoff Hurst has long been assured of legendary status.
He enjoys likewise at West Ham, where he found the net almost 250 times throughout a 14-year spell which yielded FA Cup and Cup Winners’ Cup glory.
How Hughie Ferguson was never capped by Scotland is a mystery: the Motherwell and Cardiff City icon racked up over 400 goals at a rate of more than 0.8 per game. Truly prolific stuff.
Scorer of the winner as Cardiff beat Arsenal to win the 1926/27 FA Cup – becoming the first Welsh club to do so – Ferguson bagged more goals than he made league appearances in three separate campaigns.
Derby County’s best player of all time and another of the most natural scorers in English football history, Steve Bloomer retired with a whopping 314 top-flight goals to his name.
Capped 23 times by the Three Lions – scoring just the 28 goals – Bloomer didn’t win any silverware as a player but went on to coach Spain’s Real Union to Copa del Rey victory in 1924.
Nat Lofthouse’s record of 30 in 33 gives him one of the best goals to games ratios of any player in the history of the England national team.
Bolton’s greatest of all time, the inimitable 1953 FWA Footballer of the Year spent his entire career with his hometown club and notched both goals in their 1958 FA Cup final win over Manchester United.
Prolific pretty much wherever he went, Hughie Gallacher was all about goals – especially in the colours of Scotland, for whom he struck 24 times in just 20 caps.
One of the ‘Wembley Wizards’ who famously thumped England 5-1 in 1928, Gallacher’s greatest club success came at Newcastle in the form of the 1926/27 First Division title.
A name indelibly etched into the history of English football, William Ralph ‘Dixie’ Dean’s utterly outrageous tally of 60 top-flight goals for Everton in the 1927/28 season will probably never be surpassed.
The Birkenhead-born centre-forward – who scored prolifically for local club Tranmere Rovers before winning two top-flight titles and an FA Cup with the Toffees – struck 18 times for England at a rate of 1.1 per game. Tidy.
The all-time leading scorer in British top-flight football with well over 500 Scottish Division One goals to his name, Celtic and Scotland icon Jimmy McGrory was little short of a machine at the sharp end of the pitch.
Possessing remarkable heading ability for someone who stood only five-foot-six tall, McGrory won three Scottish league titles and five Scottish Cups. He once scored eight goals for Celtic in a 9-0 demolition of Dunfermline.
If it wasn’t for the injuries which plagued him throughout his career, Michael Owen would probably be even higher up this list – such was his prodigious brilliance for Liverpool and England around the turn of the 21st century.
Ballon d’Or winner in 2001, Owen was a simple electric striker who scored some absolutely iconic goals – none more so than the devastating solo effort against Argentina at France 98 with which he well and truly announced himself to the world.
Right up there with the very best footballers Scotland has ever produced, ‘Jinky’ Jimmy Johnstone delighted spectators and bamboozled opponents with his magical dribbling abilities.
Regarded as Celtic’s greatest player of all time, the 23-cap Scottish international was integral to the Lisbon Lions’ 1967/78 European Cup triumph, notably opening the scoring in the 3-1 aggregate victory over Dukla Prague in the semi-finals.
Arguably the best number nine in world football at his peak, Harry Kane broke Tottenham and England’s all-time goals records for moving on to Bayern Munich in 2023 – and continuing to bang them in for Germany’s finest.
Formidable from open play and the penalty spot alike, Kane assumed the captaincy of his country in 2018 – winning the Golden Boot at that year’s World Cup – and later led them to successive Euros finals.
Perhaps the finest player of the Premier League era, Alan Shearer retired with a record 260 Prem goals to his name.
After firing Blackburn Rovers to the 1994/95 title and scooping his first two of three straight Golden Boots (he also won the equivalent accolade at Euro 96), the ever-clinical frontman joined Newcastle for a world-record £15m – and he emphatically lived up to his price tag by netting 206 times for his hometown club.
Denis Law aka ‘The Lawman’: one of the most legendary players ever to pull on a Manchester United shirt. In 404 appearances for the Red Devils, the scintillating striker scored 237 goals, winning two First Division titles, the FA Cup and European Cup.
Bestowed with the ultimate individual honour of the Ballon d’Or in 1964, Law – who also had two goal-laden spells with Manchester City – struck a joint record (with Kenny Dalglish) 30 times in 55 Scotland caps.
A veritable goal machine who found the net more than 400 times for club and country during a glittering career, Ian Rush has to go down as one of the greatest strikers in the history of the game.
Among Wales’ all-time leading scorers, Rush won all of the biggest honours with Liverpool – multiple times – and did the double of PFA Players’ Player of the Year and FWA Footballer of the Year in 1984, also scooping that year’s European Golden Shoe.
Arguably the best English player of the 70s, Kevin Keegan rounded off an incredible decade by winning the Ballon d’Or two years running.
An immensely gifted dribbler with a keen eye for goal and aerial ability belying his relatively short stature, the permed icon from Yorkshire claimed numerous major honours with Liverpool before gaining star status in Germany – where he inspired Hamburg to the Bundesliga title and picked up his pair of Ballons d’Or.
England captain Billy Wright said he was the best centre-forward he ever faced; Nat Lofthouse said he was the toughest centre-back he ever came up against. That was John Charles – a versatile player of world-class pedigree.
‘The Gentle Giant’ was Wales’ star man en route to the 1958 World Cup quarter-finals – while at club level, he amassed 154 goals for Leeds and 105 for Juventus, finishing as 1957/58 Serie A top scorer and winning three league titles with the Bianconeri.
A top-flight player aged 50 and an England international at 42 – both records which are almost certain never to be broken – inaugural Ballon d’Or recipient Stanley Matthews was a quite extraordinary footballer.
‘The Wizard of the Dribble’ produced mesmerising performances on a regular basis throughout his 33-year career – which surely would have yielded even more success if not for the interruption of the Second World War – the most famous being his match-winning display for Blackpool against Bolton in the 1953 FA Cup final aka ‘The Matthews Final’.
Possibly England’s finest player of the early 21st century, Wayne Rooney tore it up in the Premier League and on the international stage alike, underscoring his prodigious talent by claiming back-to-back PFA Young Player of the Year awards at 19 and 20.
Manchester United’s record goalscorer – conjuring up some truly magical finishes on his way to that milestone – and, for a while, England’s, Wazza got his hands on all of the biggest club trophies at United, where he was a five-time Prem champion.
The greatest Welsh footballer of all time, Gareth Bale was unquestionably one of the finest wingers in the world in his prime, exhibiting his electrifying skillset week in, week out for Tottenham and Real Madrid.
A two-time PFA Players’ Player of the Year while at Spurs, Bale helped Real to no fewer than five Champions League crowns – producing one of the competition’s great performances in the 2018 final against Liverpool – and was Wales’ talisman for many years, starring in their run to the semis of Euro 2016 and later becoming captain.
English football’s finest out-and-out striker of all time, Jimmy Greaves scored a record 357 goals in the old First Division, as well as 44 in 57 England caps.
As composed as he was prolific, Greaves – a Serie A champion with Milan and two-time FA Cup winner with Tottenham – finished as top-flight top scorer on six occasions and placed third in the voting for the 1963 Ballon d’Or – three years before helping his country win the World Cup (where he was unfortunate not to play in the final after missing part of the tournament injured).
Scotland and Liverpool’s greatest-ever player, Kenny Dalglish finished as Ballon d’Or runner-up behind Michel Platini in 1983 – after starring in his third of six top-flight title wins at Anfield.
Also a three-time European champion with the Reds, formidable frontman ‘King Kenny’ chalked up the best part of 400 career goals for club and country, finding the net a joint record (with Denis Law) 30 times for the latter in an outright record 102 caps.
The late Bobby Charlton was an attacking midfielder by trade, but it’s testament to the inimitable European Cup-winning Manchester United and World Cup-winning England icon’s world-class brilliance that he ranks second here – for he was a sublime forward too, whether deployed out wide or through the middle.
Unquestionably among the finest players of his generation, Charlton was an wonderfully well-rounded footballer capable of winning games almost single-handedly – though he was anything but selfish, complementing his attacking prowess, which yielded more than 300 career goals and made him both United and England’s record goalscorer for over 40 years, with tireless hard work.
As they say in Northern Ireland, Maradona good; Pele better; George Best. One of the most iconic British sportsmen there ever was, the 1968 Ballon d’Or winner is considered by some to be the greatest player never to feature at the World Cup.
An exceptionally gifted winger who starred prominently on the right of the front three which won Manchester United the 1967/68 European Cup – scoring in the final against Benfica at Wembley – Best made dribbling on the bog-like pitches of the time look astonishingly easy, and he finished as United’s top league goalscorer five seasons running between 1968 and 1972.
