Features
Anytime Goalscorer: The Best 10 Players To Back In Goal Markets In 26/27
by Jolayemi Jones
15 Aug 2026
A new season means a fresh hype and excitement, but the anytime goalscorer market rewards something different from hype; it rewards repetition. The players worth building an online sports betting strategy around are the ones who scored in game after game last season, not just the ones who posted the biggest final tally.
That distinction matters more than most bettors realise. A striker who scores 20 goals in 15 different games is a far more dependable pick than one who scores 20 goals but only finds the net in 10 of them, padding the rest with braces and hat-tricks against weaker sides. For an anytime goalscorer slip, you're not being paid for volume, you’re paid for consistency.
With that in mind, here are the 10 players who should be on your radar heading into 2026/27, and a strategy for turning them into a genuinely smart five-player slip rather than a random guess.
The Strategy For Your Betting Slip: Three Foundations + Two Situational Picks
Before getting into the individual profiles, it's worth explaining the approach, because it's the whole point of this list.
Three players sit clearly above the rest in terms of reliability: Erling Haaland, Kylian Mbappé and Harry Kane. All three are the focal point of elite attacks, all three take penalties for their clubs, and all three scored in well over half of their appearances last season. We also expect all three to be amongst the UCL top scorers. These are the players you build around every single week, the ones your slip starts with regardless of opponent.
The remaining seven names form a different kind of pool. They're all capable of scoring in bunches and all have strong recent form to lean on, but their inclusion should shift depending on the week. Fixture, venue, current minutes, penalty duty and matchup all come into play when you want to book a bet slip for goalscorers or set up a Bet Builder.
The Three Foundation Picks
While we have lots of dependable scorers in today’s world, there is no doubt this trio are a level above the rest, and they form the foundation of this strategy:
Erling Haaland
Haaland's 2025/26 season reads like a cheat code. Fifty-eight goals in 64 games for club and country, a Premier League Golden Boot, and a run of scoring in 12 consecutive matches across all competitions. But the number that should really catch a bettor's eye is this: he scored in 37 of his 64 appearances.
Those numbers tell us he is a dependable striker who scores more often than he doesn't. The final number would be greater if he didn’t enter an inexplicable barren patch midseason, during which time bettors understandably steered clear of him. Such dips are expected so it’s important to catch it when it happens and pause for a while.
Manchester City continue to build around him as the direct beneficiary of everything they create, and he remains the club's designated penalty taker, which adds a free chance to score in almost every match he plays. Under new coach Enzo Maresca, not much will change. Combine his volume with his central, undroppable role and Haaland becomes about as close to a foundation pick as this market gets.
- Bet on Haaland to score anytime against Bournemouth @
- Bet on Haaland to win the Premier League golden boot @
Kylian Mbappé
Mbappé matched Haaland's goal tally almost exactly, 58 in 60 games, but the range of what he won along the way tells you more than the number itself: Champions League Golden Boot, Pichichi and World Cup Golden Boot. That's someone producing at an elite level across every stage he plays on.
He scored in 39 of his 60 appearances and strung together an 11-game scoring run during the campaign, all while operating as Real Madrid's central striker and penalty taker. Like Haaland, the number would have been greater if he didn’t enter a mostly barren two-month patch from February.
His profile has matured too. As covered in our earlier look at his reinvention under Madrid's system, Mbappé has become a more complete No. 9, staying central, occupying defenders, and finishing with more variety than the winger version of himself ever showed. That's exactly the kind of evolution that makes a player more trustworthy in the anytime goalscorer market, not less.
Harry Kane
Kane's numbers are almost absurd once you sit with them. Seventy-three goals in 65 games for club and country, a Bundesliga Golden Boot, a DFB-Pokal Golden Boot, and the European Golden Shoe on top. But the statistic that should decide whether you trust him is this; he scored in 47 of his 65 appearances last season, comfortably the best scoring frequency of anyone on this list.
Add in Bayern Munich's penalty responsibility, his central role in an attack that's routinely one of Europe's most productive, and his ability to score with his head, either foot, or from range, and Kane arguably has the single best consistency profile of the three foundations. Volume matters, but frequency is what wins anytime goalscorer bets, and nobody on this list beats that number.
The Seven Players to Rotate
These seven players are all genuinely excellent goalscorers. What separates them from the top three is that their attractiveness shifts more with circumstance, whether that's minutes, matchup, or role, and that's precisely why they're the two flexible slots on your slip rather than automatic locks.
Lautaro Martínez
Thirty goals in 56 games for club and country last season wasn't a one-off. He has averaged roughly a goal every two games across the past five seasons and won his second Capocannoniere in three years this past season. As Inter's attacking leader, he's a strong pick whenever Inter face a side likely to give him space, especially when they play at home.
Lamine Yamal
He has quietly become more than a creator. Twenty-four goals in 45 games for last season for La Liga winners Barcelona, alongside his usual chance creation, shows a young player increasingly willing to take the simple finish rather than always searching for the spectacular one. Add penalty duty at Barcelona, and he's a strong pick against any kind of team because everything flows through him. With Robert Lewandowski now gone, I expect him to take on an even bigger role in the scoring department.
Luis Díaz
He had the best individual season of his career at Bayern Munich last season, netting 26 goals in 51 games there and 29 in 66 for club and country overall. What makes him a compelling rotational pick is continuity: the Kane-Díaz-Olise front three has now had a full campaign to build understanding, and that chemistry should only sharpen in year two. He's an easy lean whenever Bayern face an opponent likely to open up.
João Pedro
He is the trajectory pick. Twenty goals in 50 games in a difficult debut season at Chelsea was already a strong return, but he now arrives at 2026/27 with a more prominent expected role under Xabi Alonso and a red-hot pre-season - five goals in four games. Pre-season form is never proof on its own, but combined with his underlying output last season and an upgraded role, he's worth backing when Chelsea's fixture list is kind.
Deniz Undav
He is this list's value play. Thirty-one goals in 52 games for club and country last season is a scoring rate of roughly one every two games, delivered in a Bundesliga that regularly produces high-scoring matches. He remains at Stuttgart and is the focal point of their attack, which makes him a smart rotational option against sides that struggle defensively in a league that rarely locks games down.
Lionel Messi
He has shown no sign of slowing down. Ninety-two goals in 106 games for Inter Miami over the past four years, eight goals in eight World Cup appearances, and a recent run of scoring in five of his last seven club matches all point to an ageless goalscoring instinct. He's a strong pick whenever in the MLS, especially as most opponents naively give him the space he typically exploits.
Cristiano Ronaldo
He continues to defy the calendar in his own way. Thirty goals in 37 games last season, three at the World Cup, and 129 goals in 148 appearances since joining Al-Nassr, with 30-plus in each of his last three seasons there. That's sustained output in a league he continues to dominate. He's worth selecting whenever Al-Nassr face a side unlikely to trouble their attack.
How to Build Your Five-Player Slip
The formula is worth repeating clearly:
Step 1: Lock in Haaland, Mbappé, and Kane.
Step 2: Choose two from the rotational seven, Lautaro, Yamal, Díaz, João Pedro, Undav, Messi or Ronaldo, based on that week's circumstances.
What should guide those final two selections? A handful of practical factors:
- The opponent's defensive record
- Home or away venue
- Recent scoring form
- Confirmed starting status and expected minutes
- Penalty responsibility
- Tactical matchup
- Odds and value
None of this guarantees a winning slip, and nobody should treat an anytime goalscorer bet as a certainty. But this approach turns a five-player selection from guesswork into something closer to a repeatable process, which is exactly what serious anytime goalscorer betting requires.
Plenty of strikers will score goals this season. The players worth trusting are the ones who score often, in different ways, against different types of opponents. Haaland, Mbappé, and Kane meet every one of those standards and should form the backbone of your anytime goalscorer strategy all season long. The remaining seven, Lautaro, Yamal, Díaz, João Pedro, Undav, Messi and Ronaldo, give you the flexibility to adapt that slip to the fixtures in front of you each week.
Check the latest anytime goalscorer markets and current odds on BetKing before you build your slip, and use this framework as your starting point every matchday. We will be giving you weekly Anytime Goalscorer betting tips to further help you build your slips so check this page ahead of every weekend.
Enjoy more ways to win early with 1UP, 2UP, HTUP, Early Goals and Super Boosted Odds across selected matches every week with our Early Wins markets. As always, gamble responsibly and within your means.
A new season means a fresh hype and excitement, but the anytime goalscorer market rewards something different from hype; it rewards repetition. The players worth building an online sports betting strategy around are the ones who scored in game after game last season, not just the ones who posted the biggest final tally.
That distinction matters more than most bettors realise. A striker who scores 20 goals in 15 different games is a far more dependable pick than one who scores 20 goals but only finds the net in 10 of them, padding the rest with braces and hat-tricks against weaker sides. For an anytime goalscorer slip, you're not being paid for volume, you’re paid for consistency.
With that in mind, here are the 10 players who should be on your radar heading into 2026/27, and a strategy for turning them into a genuinely smart five-player slip rather than a random guess.
The Strategy For Your Betting Slip: Three Foundations + Two Situational Picks
Before getting into the individual profiles, it's worth explaining the approach, because it's the whole point of this list.
Three players sit clearly above the rest in terms of reliability: Erling Haaland, Kylian Mbappé and Harry Kane. All three are the focal point of elite attacks, all three take penalties for their clubs, and all three scored in well over half of their appearances last season. We also expect all three to be amongst the UCL top scorers. These are the players you build around every single week, the ones your slip starts with regardless of opponent.
The remaining seven names form a different kind of pool. They're all capable of scoring in bunches and all have strong recent form to lean on, but their inclusion should shift depending on the week. Fixture, venue, current minutes, penalty duty and matchup all come into play when you want to book a bet slip for goalscorers or set up a Bet Builder.
The Three Foundation Picks
While we have lots of dependable scorers in today’s world, there is no doubt this trio are a level above the rest, and they form the foundation of this strategy:
Erling Haaland
Haaland's 2025/26 season reads like a cheat code. Fifty-eight goals in 64 games for club and country, a Premier League Golden Boot, and a run of scoring in 12 consecutive matches across all competitions. But the number that should really catch a bettor's eye is this: he scored in 37 of his 64 appearances.
Those numbers tell us he is a dependable striker who scores more often than he doesn't. The final number would be greater if he didn’t enter an inexplicable barren patch midseason, during which time bettors understandably steered clear of him. Such dips are expected so it’s important to catch it when it happens and pause for a while.
Manchester City continue to build around him as the direct beneficiary of everything they create, and he remains the club's designated penalty taker, which adds a free chance to score in almost every match he plays. Under new coach Enzo Maresca, not much will change. Combine his volume with his central, undroppable role and Haaland becomes about as close to a foundation pick as this market gets.
- Bet on Haaland to score anytime against Bournemouth @
- Bet on Haaland to win the Premier League golden boot @
Kylian Mbappé
Mbappé matched Haaland's goal tally almost exactly, 58 in 60 games, but the range of what he won along the way tells you more than the number itself: Champions League Golden Boot, Pichichi and World Cup Golden Boot. That's someone producing at an elite level across every stage he plays on.
He scored in 39 of his 60 appearances and strung together an 11-game scoring run during the campaign, all while operating as Real Madrid's central striker and penalty taker. Like Haaland, the number would have been greater if he didn’t enter a mostly barren two-month patch from February.
His profile has matured too. As covered in our earlier look at his reinvention under Madrid's system, Mbappé has become a more complete No. 9, staying central, occupying defenders, and finishing with more variety than the winger version of himself ever showed. That's exactly the kind of evolution that makes a player more trustworthy in the anytime goalscorer market, not less.
Harry Kane
Kane's numbers are almost absurd once you sit with them. Seventy-three goals in 65 games for club and country, a Bundesliga Golden Boot, a DFB-Pokal Golden Boot, and the European Golden Shoe on top. But the statistic that should decide whether you trust him is this; he scored in 47 of his 65 appearances last season, comfortably the best scoring frequency of anyone on this list.
Add in Bayern Munich's penalty responsibility, his central role in an attack that's routinely one of Europe's most productive, and his ability to score with his head, either foot, or from range, and Kane arguably has the single best consistency profile of the three foundations. Volume matters, but frequency is what wins anytime goalscorer bets, and nobody on this list beats that number.
The Seven Players to Rotate
These seven players are all genuinely excellent goalscorers. What separates them from the top three is that their attractiveness shifts more with circumstance, whether that's minutes, matchup, or role, and that's precisely why they're the two flexible slots on your slip rather than automatic locks.
Lautaro Martínez
Thirty goals in 56 games for club and country last season wasn't a one-off. He has averaged roughly a goal every two games across the past five seasons and won his second Capocannoniere in three years this past season. As Inter's attacking leader, he's a strong pick whenever Inter face a side likely to give him space, especially when they play at home.
Lamine Yamal
He has quietly become more than a creator. Twenty-four goals in 45 games for last season for La Liga winners Barcelona, alongside his usual chance creation, shows a young player increasingly willing to take the simple finish rather than always searching for the spectacular one. Add penalty duty at Barcelona, and he's a strong pick against any kind of team because everything flows through him. With Robert Lewandowski now gone, I expect him to take on an even bigger role in the scoring department.
Luis Díaz
He had the best individual season of his career at Bayern Munich last season, netting 26 goals in 51 games there and 29 in 66 for club and country overall. What makes him a compelling rotational pick is continuity: the Kane-Díaz-Olise front three has now had a full campaign to build understanding, and that chemistry should only sharpen in year two. He's an easy lean whenever Bayern face an opponent likely to open up.
João Pedro
He is the trajectory pick. Twenty goals in 50 games in a difficult debut season at Chelsea was already a strong return, but he now arrives at 2026/27 with a more prominent expected role under Xabi Alonso and a red-hot pre-season - five goals in four games. Pre-season form is never proof on its own, but combined with his underlying output last season and an upgraded role, he's worth backing when Chelsea's fixture list is kind.
Deniz Undav
He is this list's value play. Thirty-one goals in 52 games for club and country last season is a scoring rate of roughly one every two games, delivered in a Bundesliga that regularly produces high-scoring matches. He remains at Stuttgart and is the focal point of their attack, which makes him a smart rotational option against sides that struggle defensively in a league that rarely locks games down.
Lionel Messi
He has shown no sign of slowing down. Ninety-two goals in 106 games for Inter Miami over the past four years, eight goals in eight World Cup appearances, and a recent run of scoring in five of his last seven club matches all point to an ageless goalscoring instinct. He's a strong pick whenever in the MLS, especially as most opponents naively give him the space he typically exploits.
Cristiano Ronaldo
He continues to defy the calendar in his own way. Thirty goals in 37 games last season, three at the World Cup, and 129 goals in 148 appearances since joining Al-Nassr, with 30-plus in each of his last three seasons there. That's sustained output in a league he continues to dominate. He's worth selecting whenever Al-Nassr face a side unlikely to trouble their attack.
How to Build Your Five-Player Slip
The formula is worth repeating clearly:
Step 1: Lock in Haaland, Mbappé, and Kane.
Step 2: Choose two from the rotational seven, Lautaro, Yamal, Díaz, João Pedro, Undav, Messi or Ronaldo, based on that week's circumstances.
What should guide those final two selections? A handful of practical factors:
- The opponent's defensive record
- Home or away venue
- Recent scoring form
- Confirmed starting status and expected minutes
- Penalty responsibility
- Tactical matchup
- Odds and value
None of this guarantees a winning slip, and nobody should treat an anytime goalscorer bet as a certainty. But this approach turns a five-player selection from guesswork into something closer to a repeatable process, which is exactly what serious anytime goalscorer betting requires.
Plenty of strikers will score goals this season. The players worth trusting are the ones who score often, in different ways, against different types of opponents. Haaland, Mbappé, and Kane meet every one of those standards and should form the backbone of your anytime goalscorer strategy all season long. The remaining seven, Lautaro, Yamal, Díaz, João Pedro, Undav, Messi and Ronaldo, give you the flexibility to adapt that slip to the fixtures in front of you each week.
Check the latest anytime goalscorer markets and current odds on BetKing before you build your slip, and use this framework as your starting point every matchday. We will be giving you weekly Anytime Goalscorer betting tips to further help you build your slips so check this page ahead of every weekend.
Enjoy more ways to win early with 1UP, 2UP, HTUP, Early Goals and Super Boosted Odds across selected matches every week with our Early Wins markets. As always, gamble responsibly and within your means.