Defoe tops Premier League all-time super subs list — SkimNews
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- Jermain Defoe tops the list as the Premier League's all-time leading substitute scorer with 24 goals off the bench, all scored in different fixtures, including a league-high five match-winners and seven England substitute goals.
- Nwankwo Kanu ranks second with 17 substitute goals (31% of his Premier League tally) and 12 assists as a sub — the latter figure bettered by only three players in Premier League history.
- Ole Gunnar Solskjaer comes in third, his legend cemented by his stoppage-time winner in the 1999 Champions League final against Bayern Munich; he scored 17 Premier League substitute goals at a 0.2-per-game rate.
- Edin Dzeko ranks fourth with 17 goal contributions across 56 substitute appearances, including a stoppage-time header that equalized against QPR two minutes before Sergio Aguero's title-winning goal in 2012.
- Javier Hernandez ranks fifth with 19 substitute goals across 78 appearances (a 0.24-per-game rate), trailed only by Sergio Aguero among players with at least 10 goals off the bench.
- Theo Walcott holds the Premier League record for most assists as a substitute (14) and scored 10 goals off the bench across stints at Arsenal, Everton and Southampton.
- Mikel Arteta's attempt to rebrand substitutes as "finishers" is dismissed by the piece, which retains the classic "super subs" framing despite the Arsenal manager's preferred terminology.
Why it matters: This ranking cements Defoe's 24 substitute goals as the all-time Premier League benchmark — a record no current player is close to challenging, with Danny Welbeck (19) the only active player in the top three. The article's dismissal of Arteta's attempt to rebrand the role as "finishers" shows the "super sub" label still carries cultural weight that managerial rebranding hasn't displaced.
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