Before we go any further, it’s important to clear up what a ‘winning goal’ is, as this always creates a lot of debate online. A winning goal is given to the player scoring the goal that is one more than the opposing team’s final total. That’s how the Premier League counts them, so that’s how we’ll count them too.

What that means is that if you score the first goal to make it 1-0, it doesn’t matter if your team then score another 10. As long as your opponents don’t score a goal, the first goal is still the winning goal.

That makes sense, too. There’s no doubting that matches change every time a goal goes in, so no one knows if you would’ve scored the second or third without the first.

By that Premier League-accepted definition, Alexandre Lacazette hit a total of nine winning goals this weekend by scoring the opener against Southampton. He was previously tied with Mohamed Salah on eight, but the Egyptian drew a blank against Manchester United, giving Arsenal’s striker the chance to move ahead.

The two goals of Lacazette’s 11 Premier League efforts that weren’t winners were as follows:

• The first goal in the 5-1 win over Fulham. Though it gave Arsenal the lead, it wasn’t a winning goal because Fulham equalised.
• The first goal in the 1-1 draw with Liverpool. That one was fairly obviously an equaliser, not a winner.

If you assume that every winning goal gets you two points (because it’s the difference between one for a draw and three for a win) and every equalising goal gets you one point, then Lacazette’s goals have won Arsenal 20 points this season. That’s more than Fulham or Huddersfield have in total!

The striker also scored a winning goal in the Europa League against Qarabag for another two points gained. Let’s hope he keeps up this habit for the rest of the season.

Lacazette may lead the Premier League in winning goals, but find out which ex-Arsenal star makes the top 10 in Europe for dribbling by clicking ‘Next’