Following Jamie Vardy's announcement that he will leave Leicester City this summer when his contract expires, Opta Analyst's Oliver Hopkins looks at the data behind his remarkable career.
Leicester City’s Jamie Vardy has announced that he is leaving the club when his contract expires in the summer.
Vardy has spent 13 unforgettable seasons at Leicester, and the Foxes referred to him as their "greatest-ever player" in the announcement of his departure. He will leave as their third-highest all-time appearance-maker and third-top goalscorer overall. His legacy, though, extends far beyond those statistics.
The 38-year-old will exit with a trophy cabinet that includes an FA Cup (2020/21), two Championship titles (2013/14 and 2023/24), and, most famously, the Premier League title in 2015/16 – the season that delivered one of the greatest underdog stories in sporting history.
Named Premier League Player of the Season in that remarkable campaign, Vardy was Leicester’s top scorer with 24 goals as Claudio Ranieri’s side produced one of football’s most improbable triumphs.
Vardy’s current record for Leicester stands at 198 goals from 496 appearances in all competitions. He is the club’s all-time leading Premier League scorer, with 143 goals in 338 appearances, which is a full 100 goals clear of the next-best tally from a Leicester player (James Maddison, 43).
Rising from non-league to Premier League
Vardy’s rise through the English league pyramid is astonishing. Just 14 seasons ago, he was playing in the seventh tier with Halifax Town, while there were eight years separating Vardy becoming top scorer in the Conference – now National League – and winning the Premier League Golden Boot in 2019/20. Aged 33, he is the oldest player in Premier League history to win the prize.
It often gets forgotten just how phenomenal Vardy’s Premier League goalscoring exploits are. But fear not - all of his records are covered below.
With 143 Premier League goals, Vardy sits 15th in the competition’s all-time scoring charts. He’s one of only 34 players to have netted 100+ Premier League goals, reaching the milestone in just 206 appearances. That’s quicker than it took some genuine all-time greats in Romelu Lukaku (216), Didier Drogba (220), Cristiano Ronaldo (223) and Wayne Rooney (247).
His goals have come at a rate of one every 183 minutes, making him more efficient than players such as Jermain Defoe (201), Teddy Sheringham (218), and Dwight Yorke (223).
In fact, since Vardy’s Premier League debut in 2014, only Harry Kane and Mohamed Salah have scored more goals in the competition. That’s quite the achievement given Leicester’s comparative status and their stint in the Championship during the 2023/24 season.
Most PL goals since Vardy's PL debut in 2014/15
| Player | Goals |
|---|---|
| Harry Kane | 210 |
| Mohamed Salah | 182 |
| Jamie Vardy | 143 |
| Sergio Aguero | 130 |
| Son Heung-min | 127 |
| Sadio Mane | 111 |
| Raheem Sterling | 111 |
| Romelu Lukaku | 89 |
| Marcus Rashford | 89 |
| Callum Wilson | 88 |
Goals scored after 30
Vardy’s rise to prominence was unlike a lot of the Premier League top scorers in that he peaked exceptionally late. The forward was 27 years and 232 days old on his top-flight debut in August 2014, meaning that the bulk of his playing time in the competition has come aged after 30.
Since turning 30, he has scored 109 Premier League goals – more than any other player, overtaking Ian Wright’s record in May 2022.
Most PL goals scored aged 30+
| Player | Goals |
|---|---|
| Jamie Vardy | 109 |
| Ian Wright | 93 |
| Alan Shearer | 84 |
| Frank Lampard | 82 |
| Teddy Sheringham | 77 |
| Mohamed Salah | 64 |
| Gianfranco Zola | 59 |
| Peter Beardsley | 58 |
| Didier Drogba | 57 |
| Les Ferdinand | 57 |
Fox in the box
All but three of Vardy's 143 Premier League goals have come inside the box, with Vardy the archetypal and also literal "fox in the box". With 97.9 per cent of his strikes coming inside the penalty area, only Yorke (98.4 per cent) has scored a higher proportion of his strikes inside the box of players to have netted 100+ Premier League goals.
Vardy is often on the periphery of matches, not really involved in the build-up for his side’s attacks. Of players to have scored 50 or more Premier League goals since the start of the 2006/07 season – since Opta have touch data records – only Javier Hernandez (20.2) and Defoe (21.3) have averaged fewer touches per game than Vardy’s 22.2.
None of this really matters when Vardy’s role is to be the man to finish off the move, something he has excelled at for over a decade.
Vardy the record-breaker
Perhaps Vardy’s most iconic individual achievement came in 2015, when he broke the record for scoring in the most consecutive Premier League matches.
Beginning on 29 August with a penalty at AFC Bournemouth, Vardy went on to score in 11 consecutive matches — a run capped by a strike against Manchester United at King Power Stadium that saw him surpass Ruud van Nistelrooy’s 10-game record.
His 13 goals during that stretch came at a 26.5 per cent conversion rate. While Vardy ultimately finished the season one goal behind Kane in the Golden Boot race, his goals proved decisive: they earned Leicester a league-high 23 points, and went a long way to helping them secure the most unlikely of Premier League titles.
From non-league to Premier League glory, Vardy’s story is one of football’s fairytales. As he prepares for his next chapter, he leaves with his legacy at King Power secure.
