{"id":4913,"date":"2026-06-17T02:31:04","date_gmt":"2026-06-17T02:31:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/?p=4913"},"modified":"2026-06-17T02:31:04","modified_gmt":"2026-06-17T02:31:04","slug":"lionel-messi-matches-cristiano-ronaldos-rare-five-world-cup-scoring-record","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/?p=4913","title":{"rendered":"Lionel Messi Matches Cristiano Ronaldo\u2019s Rare Five-World Cup Scoring Record"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"subnav-title ff-ffc bold fs-23 lh-25 uc pd-b-10\">\n            POPULAR SEARCHES\n          <\/p>\n<p class=\"subnav-title ff-ffc bold fs-23 lh-25 uc pd-b-10\">\n            BROWSE BY\n          <\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-a2155f14>Lionel Messi became the second player to score in five World Cups, giving defending champion Argentina an early 1-0 lead over Algeria on Tuesday night.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-a2155f14>Making his record sixth appearance in the tournament, the eight-time Ballon d\u2019Or winner found a crease in the Algerian defense and easily beat goalkeeper Luca Zidane for his 14th World Cup goal, sending a blue-and-white-clad crowd packed inside Arrowhead Stadium into delirium.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-a2155f14>Moments earlier, Messi had a goal disallowed for offsides.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-a2155f14>Messi joins Cristiano Ronaldo of Portugal as the only players with goals in five World Cups. Ronaldo became the first in 2022 and is set to play in his sixth World Cup on Wednesday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-a2155f14>Miroslav Klose of Germany holds the record for World Cup goals with 16, one ahead of Brazil great Ronaldo. Messi\u2019s latest highlight pulled him into a tie for third on the career list with Kylian Mbappe \u2014 who scored two goals in France\u2019s 3-1 win over Senegal earlier Tuesday \u2014 and Gerd Muller of West Germany.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-a2155f14>The goal came 20 years to the day that Messi made his World Cup debut for Argentina in a match against Serbia and Montenegro.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-a2155f14>Messi, who turns 39 next week, had been dealing with a minor hamstring injury with Inter Miami had slowed him in the lead-up to the World Cup. But he had no problems in a tuneup last week with Iceland, scoring on a penalty kick while playing 20 minutes.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-a2155f14>Messi\u2019s appearance against Algeria was the 200th of his international career, which began in 2005 at the age of 18. The only players with more are Portugal&#8217;s Ronaldo, who will play in his 229th on Wednesday against Congo, and Bader al-Mutawa, who played in his 202nd match for Kuwait in 2002.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-a2155f14>Messi-mania has swept through Kansas City ever since Argentina\u2019s arrival.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-a2155f14>On match day, thousands of fans wearing his No. 10 jersey trekked into the home of the NFL\u2019s Chiefs on the outskirts of Kansas City. Meanwhile, at a watch party at the downtown Power &amp; Light District, a real-life goat accompanied by former NFL quarterback-turned Fox broadcaster Jameis Winston came on stage wearing the same blue-and-white Argentina jersey.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-a2155f14>The argument that Messi is soccer\u2019s GOAT \u2014 greatest of all time \u2014 is becoming no argument at all with every World Cup goal.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-a2155f14><i>Reporting by the Associated Press.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>POPULAR SEARCHES BROWSE BY Lionel Messi became the second player to score in five World Cups, giving defending champion Argentina an early 1-0 lead over Algeria on Tuesday night. Making his record sixth appearance in the tournament, the eight-time Ballon d\u2019Or winner found a crease in the Algerian defense and easily beat goalkeeper Luca Zidane [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":4912,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4913","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-soccer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4913","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4913"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4913\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4912"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4913"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4913"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4913"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}