THE WORLD'S HIGHEST SCORING DEFENDER OF XXI CENTURY

• Feb 20, 2023
• History Statistics

Picture : Sergio Ramos is the leader of the ranking with 130 goals !

The World’s Highest Scoring Defender of XXI Century: Sergio Ramos

Now we publish an updated ranking for the highest scoring defenders in the world top football in XXI Century, as it stands after the end of 2022. 
Sergio Ramos is still the sovereign leader. Over the last year, he added 3 more goals for PSG and now has 130 goals at his tally.
Ramos and the retired Marcus Tulio Tanaka are only 2 defenders to score 100+ goals in XXI so far.
Keilor Soto (Costa Rica) was pretty close to reach this mark but decided to stop his career in 2022 with 93 goals amassed.
Abderrahmane Hachoud (Algeria) has now the same amount but he went to play in 2nd division where the goals are not countable for our ranking.
There are currently 62 defenders in the world that scored 50+ top level goals. They are sorted by the main ranking (Total XXI).
Five players are listed in addition to them but not ranked: they are below 50 goals in XXI but have reached this amount with the goals they scored in XX century (having still scored essential majority, not less than 65 percent, in XXI century, so being conditionally considered the “goal-scoring defenders of XXI century”). They are sorted in parallel ranking (Total Career). 
The players marked in bold are currently active; others finished the career.
All goals at top senior level are counted (top national divisions, national cups, official international club tournaments, official games between national teams).

	THE WORLD's HIGHEST		SCORING DEFENDERS
	IN XXI CENTURY
	Player	Role	Country	Goals				Total	Total	Total
				NL	NC	ICC	NT	XXI	XX	Career
1	Sergio Ramos	CB	Spain	76	10	21	23	130		130
2	Marcus Tulio Tanaka	CB	Japan	75	18	3	8	104		104
3	Abderrahmane Hachoud	RB	Algeria	71	13	9		93		93
4	Keilor Soto	CB	Costa Rica	92	1			93		93
5	Ali Maâloul	LB	Tunisia	60	3	21	2	86		86
6	Boualem Khoukhi	CB	Qatar	47	8	9	21	85		85
7	Markus Jürgenson	RB	Estonia	66	19			85		85
8	Darijo Srna	RB	Croatia	37	10	10	22	79		79
9	James Tavernier	RB	England	53	9	17		79		79
10	Mohamed Rabie Meftah	RB	Algeria	66	3	9		78		78
11	Colin Coates	CB	Northern Ireland	53	19	5		77		77
12	Dani Alves	RB	Brazil	40	10	16	8	74		74
13	Roland Juhász	CB	Hungary	55	5	8	6	74		74
14	Branislav Ivanović	CB	Serbia	40	5	15	13	73		73
15	John Terry	CB	England	42	12	13	6	73	1	74
16	Kendall Waston	CB	Costa Rica	55		9	9	73		73
17	Naldo	CB	Brazil	54	6	13		73		73
18	Espen Ruud	RB	Norway	65	4	3	1	73		73
19	Juninho	CB	Brazil	60	11	2		73		73
20	John Arne Riise	LB	Norway	35	10	7	15	67	7	74
21	Aleksandar Kolarov	LB	Serbia	39	11	6	11	67		67
22	George Horan	CB	England	55	9	2		66		66
23	Matías Rodríguez	RB	Argentina	48	9	8		65		65
24	Daniel Van Buyten	CB	Belgium	40	6	8	10	64	9	73
25	Gert Kams	RB	Estonia	51	9	1	3	64		64
26	Sergei Ignashevich	CB	Russia	39	6	10	8	63	2	65
27	Ramin Rezaeian	RB	Iran	55	4	1	3	63		63
28	Gerard Piqué	CB	Spain	31	9	16	5	61		61
29	Diego Lugano	CB	Uruguay	42	4	6	9	61		61
30	Roberto Carlos	LB	Brazil	41	7	7	6	61	63	124
31	Andrés Túñez	CB	Venezuela	40	17	4		61		61
32	Luisão	CB	Brazil	33	11	13	3	60		60
33	Johan Larsson	CB	Sweden	47	7	6		60		60
34	Mahmoud Fathallah	CB	Egypt	51	2	4	2	59		59
35	Besnik Krasniqi	RB	Kosovo	57	2			59		59
36	Alex	CB	Brazil	42	2	14		58		58
37	Léo Moura	RB	Brazil	45	5	7		57		57
38	Francisco Calvo	CB	Costa Rica	45		3	8	56		56
39	Maxi Pereira	RB	Uruguay	42	3	8	3	56		56
40	David Alaba	LB	Austria	27	6	7	15	55		55
41	Abdelkarim Hassan	CB	Qatar	30	5	5	15	55		55
42	Jan Vertonghen	CB	Belgium	33	6	7	9	55		55
43	Mikael Lustig	RB	Sweden	34	9	6	6	55		55
44	Daniel Majstorović	CB	Sweden	42	7	4	2	55		55
45	Dedi Ben Dayan	LB	Israel	46	4	4	1	55	18	73
46	Christoffer Andersson	RB	Sweden	45	6	4		55	4	59
47	Mato Neretljak	CB	Croatia	43	6	4	1	54	4	58
48	Roman Kratochvíl	CB	Slovakia	51	1	2		54	23	77
49	Mohamed Nahiri	LB	Morocco	33		17	3	53		53
50	Virgil van Dijk	CB	Netherlands	35	6	6	6	53		53
51	Nicolás Sánchez	CB	Argentina	40	6	7		53		53
52	Vilmos Vanczák	CB	Hungary	39	8	2	4	53		53
53	Yuji Nakazawa	CB	Japan	31	6		15	52	8	60
54	Marcelo	LB	Brazil	30	7	9	6	52		52
55	Thiago Silva	CB	Brazil	31	8	6	7	52		52
56	Héctor Altamirano	RB	Mexico	43	2	3	4	52	3	55
57	Mahmoud Alaa	CB	Egypt	43	5	4		52		52
58	Juan	CB	Brazil	24	5	15	7	51	9	60
59	Diego Godín	CB	Uruguay	30	4	9	8	51		51
60	Raphaël Guerreiro	LB	Portugal	37		10	4	51		51
61	Murod Kholmukhamedov	RB	Uzbekistan	44	5	1	1	51		51
62	Antônio Carlos	CB	Brazil	40	6	4		50		50
	Jersson González	RB	Colombia	38		2	1	41	19	60
	Marek Jankulovski	LB	Czech Republic	20	3	2	12	37	17	54
	Sami Hyypiä	CB	Finland	21	5	8	5	39	15	54
	Lúcio	CB	Brazil	29	5	8	4	46	5	51
	Joan Capdevila	LB	Spain	32	1	6	4	43	7	50

Brazilian state championships Paulista and Carioca have status equal to national leagues (according to IFFHS decision).
Only players which held essential majority of their games as defenders are taken in consideration. 
The column “Role” means the main position of the player (CB = centre back, RB = right back, LB = left back).  

Abbreviatures:
NL – National League
NC – National Cups
ICC – International Club Competitions
NT – National Team

Period:
from January 1, 2001 to December 31, 2022 (for the ranking Total XXI);
from the career start to December 31, 2022 (for the ranking Total Career).

Tiebreaking criteria in case of equal number of total goals: 1) international goals (ICC + NT), 2) goals scored for national team (NT), 3) goals scored in domestic league (NL).

Full names of Brazilian players:
Alex = Alex Rodrigo Dias da Costa
Antônio Carlos =Antônio Carlos dos Santos Aguiar
Juan = Juan Silveira dos Santos
Juninho =Anselmo Vendrechovski Júnior
Lúcio = Lucimar Ferreira da Silva
Luisão = Ânderson Luís da Silva
Marcelo = Marcelo Vieira da Silva Júnior
Naldo = Ronaldo Aparecido Rodrigues