Champions League Golden Boot Race: Can anyone catch Lewandowski?

Robert Lewandowski's four-goal haul in Bayern Munich's 6-0 win at FK Crvena Zvezda in November ensured he finished the Champions League group stage top scorer for the second season running. With 10 goals to his name, the Pole will hope to maintain his scoring run as Bayern seek their first Champions League triumph since their Wembley success in 2013. 

However, Lewandowski is renowed for blowing hot in the group stages and then cold when the knockout matches begin. He ended the Champions League with eight goals to his name last season, all of which were netted in the group stages, while 44 of his 63 Champions League goals have been scored in the earlier stages of the competition. 

FC Hollywood kick off their round of 16 campaign with a trip to Chelsea next week, an unfamiliar opponent for Lewandowski, who has never faced the Blues in the competition. The Bundesliga powerhouse forward will, no less, fancy his chances of hitting the back of the net against a Chelsea side that conceded the third most group stage goals (9) of those to progress to the next round of the competition. 

Yet at the time of writing, odds of 1.12 to finish as the Champions League top scorer with Oddschecker are far too short for Lewandowski. There is no denying the 31-year-old's goalscoring pedigree - he is, after all, one of the best strikers in world football at the moment - yet his knockout stage return in recent seasons means better value can be found elsewhere, particularly as the Poland international has failed to score in his last seven Champions League knockout stage appearances. 

And you don't have to look very far to find that. Sticking with German football, Erling Haaland has taken to his new surroundings with aplomb. A goal in Borussia Dortmund's 4-0 thumping of Eintracht Frankfurt on Friday means the Norwegian hitman has struck nine times in six competitive Borussia Dortmund appearances and currently sits second in the Champions League goalscoring charts with eight goals to his name. 

A new ruling that came into effect for the 2018/19 campaign stating a player can play for two sides in a Champions League season benefits Haaland, whose eight goals all came for Salzburg prior to his January switch. Haaland scored in all but one of his six Champions League outings, including goals against defending European champions Liverpool and Coppa Italia semi-finalists Napoli, and Salzburg's group stage exit all but sealed his January switch to Germany, with Dortmund welcoming him to Signal Iduna Park with open arms at the turn of the year. 

The Bundesliga title challengers may face a tough last-16 test in the form of PSG in the hotly-anticipated clash between the pair and Dortmund will be aiming to inflict further last-16 misery upon this French side, who are, of course, managed by former boss Thomas Tuchel. The defending Ligue 1 champions have conceded at least one in their last four competitive matches, including four times in their entertaining 4-4 draw at Amiens on Saturday, so PSG are far from solid at the back at present, which is a boost for Dortmund and Haaland. 

At the time of writing, Haaland's best price of 17s to finish as the Champions League top scorer on Oddschecker is behind only Lewandowski, which is a surprsingly high price for a player who is currently just two goals behind the Bayern forward in the standings. While a debutant in the competition, the 19-year-old's fine goalscoring form is proof enough that he should be taken seriously in the push for the Champions League golden boot. 

Remaining with Borussia Dortmund's meeting with PSG, Kylian Mbappe may sit five goals behind Lewandowski and three behind Haaland as one of seven players to have netted five Champions League goals this season, yet the Frenchman comes into the trip to Germany in good form. Mbappe may have just five Champions League goals to his name, yet these five goals have come in just 330 minutes of European action and at a rate of a goal every 66 minutes of Champions League football. 

Dortmund may be in flying form at the moment, but recent meetings with Augsburg, Werder Bremen and Bayer Leverkusen highlighted their defensive flaws, which Mbappe can exploit with ruthless efficiency. The France star can be found at a best price of 34s to finish as the Champions League top scorer on Oddschecker and is a solid outside bet to back. If he can maintain his rich vein of Champions League goalscoring form in Germany this week, then those will shorten, and quickly, so Mbappe is perhaps one to take a punt on, even taking into account PSG's last-16 woes in recent years. 

Finally, taking a look at the big two - Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo - the duo have been quiet in the competition this season, netting two goals apiece for Barcelona and Juventus, respectively. The best odds on Messi to land the competition's golden boot is at 26s, whereas Ronaldo to land the gong is a whopping 151.0 on Oddschecker, this despite the latter's excellent goalscoring form of late and his unbelieveable knockout stage record. 

Juventus may not be churning out the best performances under Maurizio Sarri this season, yet Ronaldo will fancy his chances of bulking up his Champions League return when the Old Lady take on a lacklustre Lyon in their last-16 double header. Even at such astronomical odds, and with eight goals to make up on Lewandowski, is it impossible to rule Ronaldo out of the reckoning for the award? Absolutely, given his 23 goals in this stage of the competition as the Portuguese star remains the big player for the grand occasion in the Champions League. 

Either way, the next couple of weeks promises goals aplenty in the Champions League, but what is for certain is that it's certainly worth backing another forward outside of Lewandowski in the race for the golden boot.