who is the top scoring substitutes in Premier League history?

Nearly every great team has a super sub, that player that can come on late and make the difference just when their team need’s it most. Here’s the rundown on the Premier League’s top goal scoring substitutes …

Peter Crouch – 16 Goals

36-year-old Crouch is still going strong for Stoke City in the Championship, although he managed to join the hallowed club of players to have scored over 100 goals in the Premier League before heading to the second tier.
The lanky striker is a specialist at coming off the bench and nicking late winners as fans of Liverpool, Southampton, Portsmouth, and Spurs, will all tell you.

Not only only is Crouchy a top striker, he’s also a top bloke, and well we love him because he does the robot dance.

Ole Gunnar Solskjær – 17 Goals

Norway international striker Solskjær (aka The Baby Faced Assassin) was famed for coming on late in games and snatching victories for Sir Alex Ferguson’s Manchester United side. In fact, he sealed the club’s greatest ever last minute win when he scored the winning goal against Bayern Munich in the 1999 Champions League final.
Legend has it his knack of coming on and netting late winners was far from a fluke, and the crafty striker used to take notes on the bench during games, so he knew exactly were the opposition defenders would leave space for him to exploit.

Nwankwo Kanu – 17 Goals
The mere mention of the name Kanu, brings flash backs of his epic late hat-trick against Chelsea to the mind of a certain generation of Premier League fans.
A rangy striker with a bag of tricks, the talented front man had the ability to turn a game on its head at any moment, as he showed plenty of times during his spells with Arsenal, West Brom and Portsmouth.

Olivier Giroud – 19 Goals
A beautiful man, with a beautiful knack of coming off the bench and finding the onion bag late in games.

The France international recently swapped Arsenal for Chelsea, and although he has moved to Stamford Bridge with the promise of more regular first-team football, I think we all know he’ll mostly end up on the bench again. But at least he’ll have plenty of chances to add to his already impressive amount of goals as a substitute.
Jermaine Defoe – 23 Goals

Defoe is arguably one of the most natural finishers the Premier League has ever seen. During his spells with West Ham, Spurs, Portsmouth, Sunderland and now Bournemouth he has demonstrated his lethal goalmouth ability time and time again.


Like Crouchy, who he partnered up front at several of his former clubs, the England international is still going strong at 36, and looks as hungry as ever to find the back on the net.