Highest scoring defenders in the Premier League – March 2025: The current and all-time leaders

Here is our comprehensive guide to the highest scoring defenders in the Premier League.

In this article, we will look at which defender is leading the 2024/25 scoring charts as of March, who the Premier League’s all-time top defensive hitmen are, and who the top-scoring defenders were in Premier League seasons gone by.

Highest scoring defenders in the Premier League for 2024/25

As of early March 2025, Manchester City left-back Josko Gvardiol is the highest-scoring defender in the Premier League so far in the 2024/25 campaign with a total of five goals to his name.

Despite being predominantly left-footed, only one of Gvardiol's goals have been scored with his favoured foot, which was his most recent one in a 3-1 win for City against Chelsea at the Etihad Stadium. His first two goals of the season were scored with his weaker right foot, in a 1-1 draw and 2-1 victory away at both Newcastle United and Wolves respectively.

Gvardiol's other two goals were scored via his head, but both headers came in 2-1 defeats away at AFC Bournemouth and at home to bitter local rivals Manchester United respectively.

Arsenal central defender Gabriel Magalhaes, Chelsea duo Trevoh Chalobah (previously on loan at Crystal Palace) and Marc Cucurella, Wolves left-back Rayan Ait-Nouri and Palace centre-half Marc Guehi are just behind the Croatia international with three goals each.

Gvardiol only needs one more goal to overtake Tottenham Hotspur central defender Cristian Romero's tally of five last season, but a further five more to reach double figures (10), a feat that has not yet been achieved by a defender in the Premier League era so far.

Indeed, the highest-scoring defender ever in a Premier League season is Neil Adams, who found the back of the net no fewer than nine times for Oldham Athletic in the 1992/93 campaign.

Top scoring Premier League defenders of all-time: The top 5

John Terry is the leader of the all-time stakes, having netted 41 times in the Premier League. Of those strikes, more than a third (16) proved to be match-winning ones, of which 11 came via his head.

Unsurprisingly, most (25) of Terry’s Premier League goals were from headers. As can be seen from the table below, he is also the only Premier League defender to date to breach the 40-goal mark:

Following on from Terry are two of Everton’s best dead ball specialists across the past three decades – David Unsworth and Leighton Baines – both of whom were lethal from the spot in their respective primes. Combined, they netted 51 out of a possible 58 times when presented with a 12-yard duel.

Much like these dead-ball legends, Baines, in particular, was also a wizard from free kicks, with a memorable double strike against West Ham in September 2013 being one of his more audacious showings in that regard:

Completing the all-time top five are Terry’s former Chelsea and England teammate Gary Cahill and Irish left-back Ian Harte, who was part of the Leeds team that made it to the UEFA Champions League semi-finals in 2001.

Now for a real trip down memory lane, as we look at which defenders did the business at both ends of the pitch in every season of the Premier League’s existence…

The top-scoring defenders in every Premier League season

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1. Matt Elliott, David Unsworth and Ian Harte also finished on six goals, but took more appearances than Taggart's 31 to reach that tally.
2. William Gallas, Lee McCulloch and Liam Ridgewell also finished on five goals, but took more appearances than Jarosik's 24 to reach that tally.
3. John Terry and Thomas Vermaelen also finished on six goals, but took more appearances than Young's 25 to reach that tally.
4. Leighton Baines also finished on five goals, but took more appearances to reach that tally.
5. Gareth McAuley and Gary Cahill also finished on six goals, but took more appearances than Alonso's 31 to reach that tally.
6. Five others finished on three goals but took more appearances – Rasmus Kristensen, Ben Mee, Virgil van Dijk, Gabriel and Ethan Pinnock.

Some interesting facts can be seen in the table:

• John-Arne Riise is the only player to be the outright top-scoring defender three times or more.
• Largely because of this, Liverpool have the highest number of outright entries in the list (six).
• Ashley Young is the only player to appear in the list on three successive occasions.
• Three of the players in the list (Bodin, Jarosik and Alexander) played for relegated teams.
• Only on two occasions has an outright highest-scoring defender also won the Premier League.

Will a Spurs player claim this particular honour for the third season running? Only time will tell, but early statistics suggest that they may not, as only Romero—last season's highest-scoring defender with five goals—Pedro Porro and Djed Spence have netted in terms of Tottenham Hotspur defenders so far in the 2024/25 campaign, with Porro scoring the most with two goals.