Strikes netted during the tournament’s bronze-medal contest will be added to a player’s overall total and factored into the chase for the top scorer award.
This means stars like Kylian Mbappe, Ousmane Dembele, Harry Kane and Jude Bellingham still have a chance to claim the top scorer honor at the 2026 edition taking place across the United States, Canada and Mexico, even though France and England were knocked out at the semi-final stage.
With only the last two fixtures left to play, those four are part of a group of seven players who have each recorded five goals or more to this point.
England and France will go head to head in Saturday’s third-place encounter. The following day, Spain battles Argentina in the showpiece final.
Mbappe sits level with Messi at the summit, both on eight goals. Messi, however, currently leads the standings thanks to registering one more assist than his rival over the course of the competition.
Norway’s Erling Haaland is the next name in the running with seven goals, though he cannot increase his tally this weekend following his nation’s elimination in the quarter-finals.
England pair Bellingham and Kane each have six goals, while France wideman Dembele and Spain attacker Mikel Oyarzabal both sit on five goals.
The battle for the top scorer prize could very well hinge on the line-ups selected by England and France for Saturday’s bronze-medal fixture.
When England met Belgium in the corresponding match in 2018, the then-manager of the Three Lions opted to make five alterations to the side that had suffered a semi-final loss to Croatia. The eventual top scorer of that edition, Kane, featured from the opening whistle but failed to find the net.
Across the history of the tournament, seven past top goal award winners have scored in the third-place play-off. Four of those seven depended on their goals in that fixture to secure the honor.
Germany’s Thomas Muller (2010), Croatia’s Davor Suker (1998), Italy’s Salvatore Schillaci (1990) and Brazil’s Leonidas (1938) all gained an edge from the contest, with efforts in those clashes ultimately proving decisive for their individual accolades.
Grzegorz Lato of Poland (1974), Portuguese icon Eusebio (1966) and France’s Just Fontaine (1958) also claimed the prize and registered a goal in the third-place fixture that same year. Yet, they would have still walked away with the award even without those contributions.
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