Ranking the 6 Longest Goal Droughts by Strikers in Premier League History

Since its inception in 1992, the Premier League has seen a plethora of remarkable attacking talents grace its fields.

While many thrived in England's top tier, others encountered difficulties adapting for a variety of reasons.

Even some of the world's finest attacking players have faced extended goal droughts from which they struggled to emerge.

Sports Brief delves into the six lengthiest goal droughts in Premier League history among forwards.

Longest goal droughts in Premier League

Alan Smith (70 Games)

It appears highly improbable that any current player will manage to surpass Alan Smith's remarkable feat of going 70 Premier League games without scoring a goal.

Smith, a forward, faced significant challenges after his transfer from Manchester United to Leeds in the mid-2000s.

He only scored six times in his debut season and just once in the following season, with his final Premier League goal occurring against Charlton in 2005.

Following this, Smith failed to score in his remaining 18 games for Manchester United and also drew a blank in all 52 of his top-flight appearances for Newcastle.

Luis Boa Morte (56 games)

Luis Boa Morte endured a goal drought throughout the 2007/08 and 2008/09 seasons for West Ham, despite appearing on the pitch 54 times.

The Portuguese international also failed to score in his last two games of the 2006/07 season, resulting in a consecutive goalless Premier League match streak of 56, a then-record. Boa Morte finally broke this streak by scoring a brief lead for the Hammers against Manchester City in their final encounter of the 2009/10 season.

Saido Berahino (48 games)

The sole goal drought on this roster that extended into 2018 belongs to Saido Berahino, whose dry spell has now surpassed the two-year mark, despite currently competing in the Championship. Stoke's relegation last summer halted his Premier League goalless streak just two games short of reaching the half-century mark.

Nearly all of Berahino's 48 scoreless matches occurred during his time at Stoke, the club that invested £12 million in the Burundi international in 2017. Remarkably, it took Berahino a total of 913 days to notch his first goal for the Potters in any competition, finally ending his drought in the second-round EFL Cup victory over Huddersfield in August of this year.

Richard Cresswell (45 games)

Richard Cresswell amassed 67 appearances in the Premier League across his spells with Sheffield Wednesday, Leicester, and Stoke, managing to score only twice, both during his time with the Owls.

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After his solitary goal against West Ham in 2000, Cresswell endured a barren spell spanning 45 games, spanning four seasons and spanning over 10 calendar years.

Brian McClair (45 games)

You might not anticipate seeing a player who became Manchester United's first to score 20 top-flight goals in a season since George Best on this list.

However, Brian McClair, who formed a formidable partnership with Mark Hughes during the Red Devils' rise to greatness in the early '90s, surprisingly went goalless in his final 45 Premier League appearances.

Ronny Rosenthal (45 games)

Ronny Rosenthal struggled to find his form during his three-year tenure at White Hart Lane. The Israeli striker notably failed to score at all in his initial full Premier League season with the club.

Following his equalizer against West Ham in March 1995, it took him a full two years to add another goal to his league tally, a consolation strike in Spurs' 4-2 loss away to Derby County.