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Bradley Wright-Phillips ties Giovanni Savarese's scoring record for New York Red Bulls

Danny Wild-USA TODAY Sports

Only Mathis, Henry and Angel are ahead of BWP on the RBNY all-time scoring chart now.

On August 15, 2015, Bradley Wright-Phillips scored a goal for the New York Red Bulls. It was a good goal. Mike Grella got the ball on the edge of the penalty area with his back to goal, turned into traffic but had the presence of mind to chip between the two defenders blocking his path and set BWP loose behind the defense.

Except there was still work to do: BWP had to control the ball, and he had a man at his back, preventing him from finding an angle with his preferred right foot. He took a touch, looking for space, but it seemed as though he might have let the moment created pass him by: his marker wasn't leaving his back and Toronto FC's 'keeper, Joe Bendik, came out to further crowd the space available. But in that moment where it seemed he might be forced wide and allow the defense to re-set, BWP slipped the ball past Bendik with his left foot.

1-0 to RBNY, who never looked back and went on to win, 3-0.

It was Wright-Phillips' 11th goal of the season for RBNY. He is the team's top-scorer and (still - though Mike Grella has just pulled level) also its leading assist-man. He looks in no danger of setting another single-season scoring record - 27 goals in a regular season doesn't happen very often in MLS (BWP's 2014 achievement was just the third time in league history anyone has scored that many in one season of MLS) - but he remains RBNY's primary and most effective scoring threat.

And he is working his way up the Red Bulls' all-time scoring chart. His most recent goal was his 44th in all competitions in his career for RBNY. It is time to make room in this club's pantheon of goal scoring heroes, because BWP has pulled level with Giovanni Savarese on the career, all-competitions scoring list: officially matching the mark set by one of the team's top-four strikers of all time. He is tied with Savarese for fourth place on the club's all-time, all-competitions goalscoring list.

Restrict the stats to all-time goals in the regular season: BWP is also joint-fourth, tied with Clint Mathis (and two behind Savarese) on 39.

He is some distance behind RBNY's top two goalscorers of all time, Juan Pablo Angel (62 goals, all-competitions) and Thierry Henry (52). But he can reasonably hope to be third on the all-time, all-competitions list by the end of the season: Clint Mathis' 45 goals is just one strike away for BWP - and he has scored in three of the Red Bulls' last four games. (Also, incidentally, the last three games the Red Bulls have won.)

BWP is now firmly established as one of the elite goalscorers in the history of this club: he is one of just five players to have scored 40 or more goals for the team in all competitions. And he has caught up with this select group of Metro legends - Angel, Henry, Mathis, Savarese - with significantly less time on the pitch than any of them were granted in their careers at the club.

Per MetroFanatic's wonderful statistical archive, here are the stats for RBNY's top five leading scorers of all time in all competitions:

Name Games Played Games Started Minutes Goals Assists
Juan Pablo Angel 112 109 9648 62 14
Thierry Henry 135 130 11510 52 49
Clint Mathis 110 99 8839 45 26
Giovanni Savarese 96 69 6425 44 13
Bradley Wright-Phillips 71 63 5556 44 12

Congrats, BWP: you're making history here, and we're very much enjoying watching you do so.

In This Article

Teams
  • New York Red Bulls
  • Toronto FC
Players
  • Juan Pablo Angel (Chivas USA)
  • Clint Mathis
  • Joe Bendik (Toronto FC)
  • Bradley Wright-Phillips (New York Red Bulls)
  • Thierry Henry (New York Red Bulls)
  • Mike Grella (New York Red Bulls)
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