Players who scored five or more goals in a game

A hat-trick is always an impressive feat – but sometimes, a player goes well beyond that in an unbelievable display of attacking prowess.

Here, we’ve picked out a selection of the names to find the net five times or more in a single match -covering the Champions League, World Cup and more, and including some records which will probably never be broken.

Without further ado, let’s get started…

One of Belgium’s greatest players of all time, Paul Van Himst scored five goals as Anderlecht demolished Finnish side Haka 10-1 in the first leg of their 1966/67 European Cup first round tie – away from home, no less.

He also notched the opener in the second leg, in which Haka kept the scoreline to a considerably more respectable 2-0.

Germany’s finest goalscorer and among the most prolific strikers in football history, Gerd Muller showed just how devastating he could be in this 1972/73 European Cup first round clash.

‘Der Bomber’ found the net five times as Bayern Munich trounced Omonia Nicosia of Cyprus 9-0 in the first leg – then bagged a brace in a 4-0 second-leg win which completed a 13-0 aggregate triumph.

Both sides were eliminated from the 1994 World Cup after this, their final group game, but Russia made sure they went out with a bang by battering Cameroon 6-1 in Stanford, California.

Oleg Salenko got his country’s first five goals – hitting a first-half hat-trick – taking him to six for the tournament, enough to share the Golden Boot with Bulgaria’s Hristo Stoichkov come the end of the tournament.

Premier League goalscoring legend Andy Cole was the first player to find the net five times in a single match in the competition.

‘Cole the Goal’ achieved the feat just a couple of months after joining Manchester United in a British-record transfer from Newcastle, running riot as the Red Devils eviscerated Ipswich 9-0 at Old Trafford.

The ultimate Premier League goalscorer, Alan Shearer registered five of his league-record total of 260 during Newcastle’s 8-0 annihilation of Sheffield Wednesday early in the 1999/2000 season.

Shearer completed his hat-trick inside 42 minutes and dispatched two penalties on a memorable afternoon at St. James’ Park, as the Magpies marked Sir Bobby Robson’s first home game as manager in some style.

Tottenham became only the second team to rack up nine goals in a Premier League fixture as they made mincemeat of Wigan with a 9-1 win at White Hart Lane in November 2009.

Incredibly, it was only 1-0 to Spurs at half-time – but whatever Harry Redknapp said to his side must have struck a chord with Jermain Defoe, who hit a seven-minute hat-trick then struck twice more for good measure.

It comes as little surprise that Lionel Messi once managed to get on the scoresheet five times in a single Champions League outing.

The GOAT tore Bayer Leverkusen a new one in this 2011/12 last 16 clash at the Camp Nou, registering twice in the first half and three times in the second as Barcelona inflicted a 7-1 second-leg thrashing on their German opponents.

Just as unsurprisingly, Erling Haaland knows what it’s like to produce a five-star Champions League display.

Manchester City entered the second leg of their 2022/23 last 16 tie against RB Leipzig all square at 1-1, but their Norwegian goal machine emphatically put them into the quarter-finals, scoring a first-half hat-trick in a 7-0 win.

Born in Argentina, 1961 Ballon d’Or winner Omar Sivori represented both his homeland and Italy at international level – and he played most of his club football in Serie A.

He bagged the bulk of his career goals for Juventus, including six in a 9-1 drubbing of Inter en route to the 1960/61 Scudetto.

A free-scoring striker who finished as Bundesliga top scorer in successive seasons during the 70s, Dieter Muller fired Koln to the 1977/78 title.

His six-goal haul in a 7-2 league victory at home to Werder Bremen in August 1977 – spread evenly either side of half-time – set a German top-flight record.

A World Cup winner with Argentina later that year, Julian Alvarez underlined his prodigious talent in this 2022 Copa Libertadores group stage encounter.

Late in his River Plate career (he would soon join Manchester City, having initially remained at River on loan after being signed by the perennial English champions), Alvarez notched six of his side’s goals as they swept aside Peru’s Alianza Lima 8-1.

Up there with Arsenal’s all-time top goalscorers, Ted Drake set an English top-flight record against Aston Villa in December 1935.

The England centre-forward – who had finished as the First Division’s leading marskman en route to the tile the previous season – helped himself to all of his team’s goals as the Gunners laid waste to Aston Villa at Villa Park, triumphing 7-1.

Hungarian by birth, Laszlo Kubala played international football for Hungary, Czechoslovakia and Spain – but he is best-known for his association with the latter, where he scored freely for Barcelona from 1951 to 1961.

In his first LaLiga campaign – which culminated in glory – Kubala got on the scoresheet seven times in a 9-0 downing of Sporting Gijon.

Scottish icon Jimmy McGrory chalked up well over 500 career goals – and the vast majority of those came in Celtic colours.

A three-time champion of Scotland with the Glasgow giants, McGrory netted eight times (a British top-flight record) in a 9-0 success against Dunfermline at Celtic Park in January 1928.

Joe Payne’s astonishing 10-goal haul for Luton in their 12-0 dismantling of Bristol Rovers in the 1935/36 Third Division South seems destined to remain a Football League record for evermore.

Arguably the most remarkable detail of all is that Payne only came into the side due to injuries – having not played for seven months.

Australia’s 31-0 (not a typo) win over American Samoa during 2002 World Cup qualification has understandably gone down in history.

Archie Thompson famously set an international record with 13 goals – eight of them in the first-half, including a hat-trick inside 27 minutes – but he wasn’t the only Australian player to find the net an outrageous number of times that night in Coffs Harbour, New South Wales.

David Zdrilic’s name is less well-known, but Thompson’s strike partner nabbed eight goals himself – actually completing his hat-trick two minutes earlier.