Remembering Alan Shearer, top scorer in Premier League history

Alan Shearer was a complete footballer. He was not just a striker but the team’s inspiration and its leader. He had an eye for goal, excellent positioning, real physical strength, a powerful shot and fine technical skills.
He began his career at Southampton in 1988. He made his debut at 17 in a home game against Arsenal and scored a hat-trick, becoming the youngest player to score three goals in an English First Division game. He played 118 games and scored 23 goals for the Saints until 1992, when Blackburn bought him.
Shearer scored 112 league goals in 138 games for Rovers. His biggest success at Blackburn was the Premier League title in 1994/95, when he found the net 34 times in 42 games. That was his best spell in the Premiership: he scored more than 30 goals in three consecutive seasons. In 1996 he moved to Newcastle United, where he stayed until the end of his career in 2006. The striker made 303 league appearances and scored 148 goals. He helped the Magpies through their first Champions League group stage in 2002/03, although the club went out in the second group stage.
With the Magpies he finished as Premier League runner-up in 1996/97 and reached the FA Cup final twice, but never won the trophy.
He made his England debut in 1992 against France, scoring on the occasion, and played for his country until 2000. Alan Shearer scored 30 goals in 63 games for the Three Lions. He holds the record for the most goals scored in the Premier League (260). He played at three major tournaments: Euro 1996, the 1998 FIFA World Cup and Euro 2000. Shearer helped England reach the semi-finals of Euro 1996 and finished as the tournament’s top scorer with 5 goals.
The legendary striker collected many individual awards, among them the UEFA Euro Golden Boot in 1996 and the Premier League Player of the Season award in 1995.
He retired from professional football in 2006 at the age of 36. In 2009 Shearer was interim manager of his former club Newcastle, but the Magpies were relegated at the end of the season. He went on to work as a pundit for the BBC.

The record transfers

Shearer was born on 13 August 1970 in Gosforth, Newcastle upon Tyne, so the move to St James’ Park in 1996 was a return home. Both of his big transfers set records. Blackburn Rovers paid Southampton £3.6 million in July 1992, an English transfer record that made him the most expensive player in British football. Four years later, on 30 July 1996, Newcastle United paid Blackburn £15 million, a world transfer record at the time.

Shearer also became England captain in 1996, appointed by Glenn Hoddle. He led the team at the 1998 World Cup and kept the armband until he retired from international football after Euro 2000, captaining England 34 times in all.

The final season at Newcastle

The last months of his career brought a record that had stood for 49 years. On 4 February 2006, against Portsmouth, Shearer scored his 201st goal for Newcastle and overtook Jackie Milburn’s club record of 200. He finished with 206 goals for the club.

His final goal came at the Stadium of Light on 17 April 2006, in a 4-1 win over Sunderland. Later in the same match he tore the medial collateral ligament in his left knee in a collision, missed the last three games of the season, and the injury brought his retirement forward.

Recognition followed. Shearer was appointed OBE in the 2001 Birthday Honours and CBE in the 2016 Birthday Honours, and in 2021 he was among the first players inducted into the Premier League Hall of Fame. After retiring he became a regular pundit on the BBC’s Match of the Day, a role he left briefly in 2009 to manage Newcastle.