Lionel Messi has become the leading scorer in World Cup history after netting his 17th career goal in the tournament against Austria. The Argentina captain, now playing in his sixth World Cup, moved past Germany’s Miroslav Klose, who had held the record for 12 years after overtaking Brazil’s Ronaldo.
Messi’s first World Cup goal came on June 16, 2006, in Argentina’s 6-0 win over Bosnia and Herzegovina, when he was 18 and still an emerging talent. He failed to score at the 2010 World Cup, then waited eight more years for his next goal, again against Bosnia and Herzegovina. In 2014, he added three more, against Iran and Nigeria, but did not score in the knockout rounds. Four years later, he scored again against Nigeria, but that was his only goal in the 2018 tournament.
His World Cup legend was cemented in Qatar in 2022. After scoring in a loss to Saudi Arabia and then against Mexico, he scored for the first time in a World Cup knockout stage, against Australia in the round of 16, then against the Netherlands in the quarterfinals, Croatia in the semifinals, and twice against France in the final. In the opening match of the current tournament, he scored his first World Cup hat trick, bringing him to 16 goals before the record-breaking strike.
The report also notes that Kylian Mbappé could still challenge the mark this tournament. Mbappé scored twice against Senegal in the opening round and now has 14 World Cup goals, with at least two more matches still ahead in the current event and, likely, at least one more World Cup in his career.
