Football writer Alex Keble reflects on Son Heung-min's impact and achievements at Tottenham Hotspur, following the South Korean's confirmation he will leave this summer.
As Tottenham Hotspur fans went wild in Bilbao, as the tears and the alcohol flowed, and as the feat of winning a first major trophy in 17 years started to sink in, there was one player who repeatedly came to mind.
Son Heung-min had long since become the fans’ representative on the pitch.
The image of their captain sobbing on James Maddison’s shoulder at full-time spoke to how every Spurs fan felt after the UEFA Europa League final, and there was of course nobody more fitting to lift the famous trophy than Son: a player who across 10 years at the club secured his place as a legend.
That Son will not be a Spurs player beyond this summer is difficult for fans to take. But he leaves with his legacy secure, not because of that Europa League victory but for a decade of service and for consistently dazzling performances that brought 127 goals and 71 assists in the Premier League alone.
The Puskas Award winner of 2019, the Golden Boot winner of 2021/22, and the first Asian player to join the 100 Club: Son Heung-min goes down as one of the Premier League’s greatest ever players.
Watch Son's best Premier League moments
A top-20 player for both goals and assists
Son netted 127 Premier League goals and registered 71 assists, ranking him 16th and 17th respectively for those statistics in the competition's history.
That’s 198 goal involvements combined, for which he is ranked 13th in the all-time chart.
It speaks volumes that Son is one of only seven players to sit in both of the separate top 20 lists for all-time goals and assists, along with undisputed legends such as Wayne Rooney, Thierry Henry, Frank Lampard, Andrew Cole, Teddy Sheringham, and Mohamed Salah.
Son scored more goals than Dwight Yorke or Ian Wright; assisted more than Paul Scholes or Eden Hazard. The statistical evidence alone tells us we have witnessed greatness.
Comparing Son to his contemporaries provides further evidence. Since his Premier League debut in 2015, only Salah (270) and Harry Kane (231) have scored and assisted more goals:
PL goal involvements since Son's debut (Sep 2015)
| Player | Goals + assists |
| Mohamed Salah | 270 |
|---|---|
| Harry Kane | 231 |
| Son Heung-min | 198 |
| Kevin De Bruyne | 190 |
| Jamie Vardy | 177 |
| Raheem Sterling | 154 |
| Sadio Mane | 134 |
| Roberto Firmino | 132 |
| Riyad Mahrez | 132 |
| Marcus Rashford | 131 |
And in Spurs terms, it’s even starker. He is ranked fifth in the club’s all-time chart for scoring goals (173) and has played more Premier League matches than any other Spurs player (333).
When a Son goal won global recognition
It isn’t just for statistical reasons that Spurs fans fell in love with Son.
No, it was because of his consistently phenomenal performances and his ability to conjure magic out of nothing, perhaps most memorably for his Puskas Award-winning solo goal against Burnley in 2019.
That goal was typical of Son’s brilliance; of his ability to ghost past people - on either side - with blistering pace and a ruthless finishing touch.
Watch Son's Puskas Award-winning goal
Son and Kane - a prolific pairing
Son’s time in England was also defined by his iconic partnership with Kane, which peaked during the Mauricio Pochettino era when Spurs' two superstars propelled them to a runners-up spot in the 2016/17 Premier League and a place in the 2019 UEFA Champions League final.
Kane and Son combined directly for 47 goals (Son assisting 23 for Kane, Kane assisting 24 for Son), making them the most prolific partnership in Premier League history.
Yet even this isn’t what assures Son’s iconic status.
Son stayed to win silverware
Kane is perhaps Spurs’ best-ever Premier League player in terms of quality, while Luka Modric and Gareth Bale are widely considered to be better players than Son.
But all three decided to leave Spurs in the pursuit of silverware. Son chose to stay.
At the height of his powers in the summer of 2021, with Spurs having finished seventh and Son’s contract beginning to run low, he could have jumped. Instead, he signed a new four-year deal.
It is that decision that separates him from other recent greats. Well, that and his reward for doing so: Spurs’ first trophy since 2008 and first European honour since 1984.
Breaking barriers for Asian players could be Son’s greatest legacy
But perhaps Son’s most extraordinary impact of all was his influence as the first Asian superstar in English football.
His sheer talent has helped to challenge stereotypes about Asian footballers, and while many of these sadly still exist, Son’s talent should pave the way for wider acceptance that signings from Asia can be so much more than industrious.
Spurs' crowds over the last 10 years have been richer in diversity, too, as South Korean supporters have regularly flown across the world for a glimpse of Son's celebrity.
It’s a celebrity that is often misunderstood in England. Son has extraordinary, David-Beckham-in-his-prime levels of fame in Korea, ranking second in Forbes' 'Korea Power Celebrity 40' in each of the last three years.
That fame comes from his phenomenal success compared to any Asian footballer before him.
Son is the all-time top Asian goalscorer in both the Premier League and Champions League. He was the first Asian player to reach 100 Premier League goals and the first Asian player to win the Golden Boot.
He has won the "Best Footballer in Asia" award in eight of his 10 years at Spurs and, unsurprisingly, is widely regarded as the greatest Asian player of all time.
That’s why Son is an icon back home, yet his nationality has nothing to do with Spurs fans celebrating him as one of the Premier League’s greatest ever.
Nor does winning the Europa League. That was just the icing on the cake.
In a pitchside interview shortly after the final whistle in Bilbao, Son was asked if he thought he was now a legend.
He didn’t even have time to answer before fellow Spurs great Bale, working as a pundit for TNT Sports, stepped in to say what all of the club's fans were thinking: "He already was!"