Phillips nets Golden prize

Phillips' Premiership goals won him an England call-up

Sunderland hotshot Kevin Phillips has become the first Englishman to win Europe's prestigious Golden Shoe award.

The prize, formerly known as the Golden Boot, is judged by ESM, a group of nine specialist football magazines which includes France Football and Britain's World Soccer.

Phillips' 30 Premiership goals were deemed by ESM to be a better return than Porto striker Mario Jardel's 38 goals in 34 games and Ruud van Nistelrooy's 29 goals for PSV Eindhoven.

Jardel was the only man to score more top-flight goals than the Englishman but was marked down due to the relative weakness of the Portuguese league compared with the Premiership.

France Football first awarded the Golden Boot in 1967, and continued to do so until 1992. ESM revived the prize in 1997 and the past three winners have been Ronaldo for Barcelona, Nikos Machlas for Vitesse Arnhem and Jardel.

The very first winner was Benfica great Eusebio, and other recipients include Marco Van Basten, Gerd Muller and Ian Rush.