Robert Lewandowski may already have Champions League Golden Boot laced up

Barring something extraordinary – and we are talking about two players who can make the extraordinary look absurdly ordinary – neither Lionel Messi nor Cristiano Ronaldo will be crowned the Champions League’s top scorer this season.

Between them, these two ridiculously talented superstars have been the competition’s top scorer in each of the last 12 seasons.

Ronaldo has claimed the prize seven times, Messi on six occasions and they have once shared the accolade – that was in 2014-15 when Neymar, then a teammate of Messi at Camp Nou, joined them on the ten-goal mark. Neymar won’t be winning the title this season, either.

Messi has managed just two goals and even though that leaves him eight adrift of Bayern Munich’s Robert Lewandowski, six behind Erling Haaland of Salzburg, four behind Harry Kane and trailing many more besides, the Argentina genius goes into the final round of group games third favourite for top-scorer honours.

Ronaldo has struck just once for Juventus in five appearances.

Both players, health permitting, will appear in the knockout stage but so too will Lewandowski and the Pole has already been handed the Golden Boot accolade by the layers who rate him 1-12 at best.

The Bayern Munich goal-getter is clearly in an incredibly strong position but is he the certainty his odds imply?

The danger doesn’t appear to be either Messi or Ronaldo, no matter how impressive their pedigree. Indeed, Ronaldo comes to life in the knockout stages with 65 goals in 77 matches at 0.84 goals per game.

But he would surely need to play all seven knockout-stage matches to have any sort of a sniff and it isn’t as though Lewandowski's taps are necessarily going to be turned off at the same time.

Eight-goal Haaland might seem generously priced at 20-1 but he isn’t. Salzburg have to beat holders Liverpool at home on Tuesday to even make the last 16.

Then comes Kane on six and at least Tottenham have made it to the knockout stages. Jose Mourinho may, of course, give the England captain the night off in Munich next week and the Londoners are going through as group runners-up, so have to expect a brute of a last-16 tie.

In five of the last eight seasons the Golden Boot winner has had to score more than ten goals to claim the prize so, statistically at least, it's fair to assume Bayern ace Lewandowski may have to find the net at least once more.

Then again, unlike previous seasons, neither Messi nor Ronaldo appear to be factors so it’s entirely possible he has already done enough.

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