6 players we can’t believe don’t have a single Premier League goal or assist
We all know about the incredible Premier League goals and assists records of great players like Alan Shearer, Thierry Henry and Mohamed Salah. But what about those without a single one to their name?
A mix of fan favourites and notorious flops from Leeds United, Chelsea, Manchester United and Tottenham feature in this particular inauspicious club.
Here are six players who failed to register a single goal or assist in the Premier League.
Juan Cuadrado
The Colombian winger has over 100 direct goal contributions in a long and distinguished Serie A career, having turned out for Udinese, Lecce, Fiorentina, Juventus and now Atalanta.
It’s no major disgrace that he doesn’t have a single goal or assist in English football, given his time amounted to one half-season at Chelsea.
But you’d have expected him to have contributed something in his short Premier League sojourn. A winger signed in his prime for a £23million fee midway through a title-winning campaign.
Mohamed Salah, Kevin De Bruyne, Radamel Falcao and even Alexandre Pato(!) all contributed goals and/or assists during their similarly brief and underwhelming stints at Stamford Bridge.
Lucas Radebe
Surprisingly enough, Radebe started out as a midfielder at his boyhood club Kaizer Chiefs. You wouldn’t know it from his time at Leeds.
A brilliant centre-back in his time, goals and assists weren’t the South African’s currency. It’s not what he’s judged on and nor should it be. But the fact that he neither scored nor assisted after across 10 Premier League seasons at Elland Road is certainly a quirky footnote.
No outfield player has more Premier League games or minutes without notching a single goal or assist. Radebe played 197 top-flight matches for the Yorkshire club.
Radebe by no means stands alone in the no goals club. But his fellow members at least set up a goal or two.
Stephane Henchoz got one assist in 21,686 minutes for Liverpool and Blackburn, Danny Simpson got a paltry three assists as a Premier League full-back and even Tony Hibbert got eight assists for Everton.
QUIZ: Can you name the 25 players with the most Premier League games without ever scoring?
Richard Hughes
One to be filed alongside Radebe more due to longevity rather than his function in the team, Liverpool’s current Premier League sporting director played over a hundred times as a stalwart for prime Barclays-era Portsmouth.
Zero goals and zero assists in all that time, as a midfielder to boot. Maybe being rubbish himself in the final third has helped him identify those traits in others.
READ NEXT: The 10 Premier League players with the most goals after turning 30: Vardy, Lampard…
TRY A QUIZ: Can you name the top Premier League goalscorer for every nationality?
Didier Zokora
Another midfielder that was very much in the defensive mould, Zokora’s game wasn’t necessarily about creativity or defence-splitting passes.
Yet you’d have thought across three seasons at Tottenham and 88 Premier League appearances, just by the balance of probabilities at some point he’d have played the final pass before a goal or find himself in the right place at the right time to toe home a set piece.
In his entire career, the Ivorian notched two goals and 22 assists. He even assisted in three successive FA Cup outings for Spurs in their 2006-07 run but never did so in the league.
Rhian Brewster
On the one hand, we’re not massively surprised that Brewster doesn’t have a single Premier League goal or assist to his name, given how infamously he struggled at Sheffield United.
But a few years back you’d never predicted this, back when he was on the fringes of Liverpool’s all-conquering squad and tipped to break into Jurgen Klopp’s first-team plans.
At one time he was rated as one of the most promising youth prospects in the country, which explains how and why they were able to rinse Blades to the tune of £23.5million.
Across two seasons, the striker has made 40 Premier League appearances totalling 1462 minutes and has neither scored nor set one up.
David de Gea
David de Gea!? You can’t include goalkeepers on this list, surely? Watch us.
The Spaniard holds the distinction of being the player with the most Premier League appearances without a single goal or assist to their name. Four hundred and fifteen.
Six ‘keepers have played more Premier League matches than the former Manchester United No.1, but all of them made some kind of contribution at the other end.
David James notched two assists in 572 outings, Mark Schwarzer has one assist, Brad Friedel memorably scored once, Shay Given got two assists in 450 games, Petr Cech two assists in 443 games and Jussi Jaaskelainen – perhaps unsurprisingly for someone routinely told to pump it long – notched three assists in his long Premier League career.
Meanwhile, Alisson Becker has one goal and three assists in 207 Premier League games for Liverpool, and Ederson has four Premier League assists for Manchester City.