Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)

Prolific hitman Phillips tips Lukaku, Kane, Aguero & Morata to smash records this season in hot pursuit of Prem’s goalscorin­g gong

- BY MIKE WALTERS

GOLDEN BOOT champion Kevin Phillips believes a glut of Premier League goalscorin­g records could fall to the Fab Four heading the charts.

Romelu Lukaku (seven in as many games), Harry Kane, Sergio Aguero and Alvaro Morata (six each) have all hit their stride in the first two months of the season.

And Phillips, the last Englishman before Kane to win the coveted gong as the nation’s top marksman – with Sunderland back in 1999-2000

– says all four are capable of reaching the “holy grail” of 30 goals this season.

Now on Gary Rowett’s coaching staff at Derby County in the Championsh­ip, Phillips

(right) went from stacking TVS in a Dixons warehouse, and playing non-league at Baldock Town, to the Premier League’s one in a bullion.

Only two players – Cristiano Ronaldo and Luis Suarez, who hit 31 goals apiece – have scored more in a season since KP’S 30 for the Black Cats at the turn of the millennium.

But the former England striker fancies at least one of the Fab Four to beat them. Phillips said: “I remember how hard I had to work for my 30 goals that season – and, with all due respect to Sunderland, where I had a fantastic time and the fans were brilliant to me, I was at a less ‘fashionabl­e’ club.

“Lukaku, Kane, Aguero and Morata are all in teams who play in the Champions League. Their squads are stacked with quality from back to front, and they create a lot of chances every week.

“On the flip side of that, each of those strikers is capable of creating something out of nothing by dropping deep, driving at defenders, dipping a shoulder and ‘see you later’.

“At first, I wasn’t sure if that applied so much to Morata, but then he picked the ball up from the halfway line at Stoke, ran past three or four opponents and

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