Robert Lewandowksi has once more topped the Bundesliga scoring charts and in the process, claimed a piece of history.
Entering the final matchday of the Bundesliga season with Bayern Munich having already clinched the league title and Lewandowski holding a commanding edge in the race for top scorer, neither are likely to be too disappointed by the 4-1 defeat to Stuttgart.
Lewandowski claimed an assist during the contest but failed to find the net, meaning he finished the campaign on 29 goals; more than enough to finish top of the Bundesliga scoring charts for the third season in his career.
"It's a great honor to be the top scorer again," Lewandowski wrote on Twitter. "Lots of thanks to my team-mates, without them it would not be possible!"
While the Poland international’s inability to score in the league finale left him short of matching Gerd Muller’s mark of three straight 30-goal campaigns, Lewandowski officially achieved his own share of history anyway.
Lewandowski became the first non-German player to finish top of the Bundesliga scoring charts three times.
Only one other non-German player had managed to do it twice. Ghana international Anthony Yeboah was co-top scorer two years running, in 1992-93 and 93-94, with Eintracht Frankfurt.
Lewandowski first achieved the honor in 2013-14, 20 years after Yeboah's second top scorer campaign, when he pulled in a more modest 20 goal haul for Borussia Dortmund. He managed the feat again two years later after joining Bayern Munich, notching 30 goals in 2015-16.
And after former Dortmund man Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang pipped him by a single goal last year 31-30, Lewandowski claimed it in force this season, nearly doubling the total of the second place finisher, Nils Petersen, who managed 15 to Lewandowksi’s 29.
Lewandowski was also the only Bayern Munich player to reach double digits in Bundesliga goals this season. Sandro Wagner and Thomas Muller were co-second on the club with eight goals on the campaign.
With Aubameyang now in England, it may be Lewandowski on top of the goal charts once again next season, with the only barrier toward it happening being a possible move away from Bayern this summer.