Suarez well ahead of Henry, RVP and Ronaldo in record hunt

Factors obviously exist as to why Luis Suarez will not be the first player in the current era of 20 teams to score 32 Premier League goals or more.

Top of these reasons is that he may depart for Real Madrid in January, but given that Suarez has signed a new contract in the past week and appears to be enjoying his football as much as ever at Liverpool, it looks unlikely that he will leave before the summer.

Then there is the Suarez risk of doing something stupid and picking up a suspension, alongside the risk of injury that hangs over every footballer.

Despite these drawbacks, it is still exceedingly difficult to argue that Suarez’ odds of 8/11 to score at least 32 Premier League goals this season is not one of the best bets of the entire campaign.

Only five players have previously netted 30 or more goals in a 20-team Premier League season and none of these have reached 19 quicker than Suarez, who has done so through 17 games, despite missing the first five through suspension.

Interestingly, Thierry Henry took until February to score 19 in the 2003/04 season, while Robin van Persie in 2012 and Cristiano Ronaldo in 2008, the two most recent to join the 30+ club, did so on the eve of the FA Cup fourth round weekend.

Kevin Phillips only needed 18 games to score 19 goals when firing on all cylinders for Sunderland in the 1999/00 campaign, but he eventually paid for missing the Xmas and New Year period and the failure to score a single goal between December 18th and January 23rd.

Alan Shearer is the fifth player to reach the milestone after scoring 31 goals in the 1995/96 campaign, but four goals in a two-month spell between February and April eventually halted his charge.

A barren streak is bound to come for Suarez after 10 goals in four games, but he has never gone longer than four Premier League games without a goal.

What is also interesting is that Premier League leaders Liverpool not only get to welcome the six teams currently directly below them in the standings to Anfield in the second half of the campaign, but they have scored at least three goals against all of the bottom seven clubs in the division.