While many of us attempted to break our own record for the number of chocolate eggs eaten in a single sitting over the Easter weekend, in the Premier League a pair of players were reaching rather more athletic milestones of their own.
Son Heung-min became the latest inductee into the Premier League’s 100-goal club. The Tottenham ace scored a screamer in the 2-1 win over Brighton, and joined the other scorer that day – Harry Kane – as the only Spurs players to bring up their century of goals in the EPL.
Meanwhile, on the south coast of England, Kevin de Bruyne was accomplishing a notable feat of his own. The Man City maestro brought up his 100th assist in the Premier League when creating Erling Haaland’s opener on the stroke of half-time.
As if creating 100 Premier League goals wasn’t enough of a milestone in its own right, De Bruyne recorded his ton faster than any other player – in just 237 appearances, to be exact. The next best, Cesc Fabregas, needed 293 games to get to 100.
While scoring 100 Premier League goals is impressive enough, creating a century of them is arguably more of an achievement – you still need somebody to put your assist in the back of the net. You wonder how many big chances De Bruyne has created at Manchester City over the years that could have added to his assist haul.
It’s telling that, as of April 2023, only five players have recorded 100 or more assists in Premier League action….
Ryan Giggs (162 assists)
It’s hard to imagine anyone reaching Ryan Giggs’ extraordinary record of 162 Premier League assists – then again, it’s hard to imagine anyone playing 23 seasons in the English top-flight either, as the Welshman did for Manchester United.
He benefited from playing with some outstanding strikers in his time at Old Trafford, from Mark Hughes, Andy Cole and Ole Gunnar-Solskjaer to Ruud van Nistelrooy, Wayne Rooney and Robin van Persie – that always helps an assist king along the way. Some chap by the name of Cristiano Ronaldo also enjoyed a fine career at United that overlapped with Giggs’….
According to the history books, in more than 600 appearances Giggs played a whopping 6,659 passes and delivered 1,235 crosses – is it any wonder he’s the most creative player in Premier League history?
Cesc Fabregas (111 assists)
Although it seems nigh-on a certainty that De Bruyne will eventually overtake Cesc Fabregas as the second best assist-provider in Premier League history, that should not detract from the Spaniard’s awesome achievement while playing for Arsenal and Chelsea.
Fabregas was not an attacking player by trade, as a record of 50 goals in 350 Premier League appearances attests. And so his assists tended to be passes from deeper positions – confirmation of his vision and ability to land the ball perfectly for the likes of Thierry Henry and Diego Costa.
During the 2014/15 season, Fabregas delivered 18 assists for Chelsea in the Premier League – a tally only surpassed three times in the competition’s history by De Bruyne (2019/20), Henry (2002/03) and Mesut Ozil (2015/16).
Wayne Rooney (103 assists)
It’s only in the years to come that we’ll perhaps only begin to appreciate what an extraordinary player Wayne Rooney was.
He’s the only player in Premier League history to score 200 goals and make 100 assists, and that’s a record that will surely never be beaten.
To make it all the more impressive, Rooney delivered those numbers while representing just two clubs – Everton and Manchester United – and his 311 goal involvements in the EPL came in just 491 appearances.
Factor in that he was, for a time, England’s record goalscorer as well, and you begin to scratch the surface of why Rooney deserves the accolade of being one of the best of all-time.
Frank Lampard (102 assists)
Lampard is the third member of the Premier League’s 100 goals, 100 assists club alongside Giggs and Rooney.
An attacking midfielder with an eye for goal, the Chelsea legend was often well-positioned to get in amongst the action in the final third of the pitch, and he did that with some aplomb.
His 179 Premier League goal involvements came in 609 appearances, which means that Lampard influenced a goal in some way in roughly one-out-of-three games – a staggering achievement for a midfielder.
Kevin de Bruyne (100 assists and counting)
It’s amazing to think that De Bruyne has played nine seasons in the Premier League, but in two of those he only served up a combined total of three assists.
So his 97 other goal-creations have come in six-and-a-bit campaigns, which highlights the extraordinary strike rate that the Belgian has delivered.
Of all the players he has lined up alongside, it’s Sergio Aguero that benefitted the most from De Bruyne’s brilliance – the Argentine scored 19 of his Premier League goals directly from an assist from his strawberry blonde teammate.