Lionel Messi’s late goal against Egypt did more than help spark a comeback, it extended a run of World Cup records that now stretches back nearly two decades.
The strike marked Messi’s fifth consecutive goal-scoring match at this tournament, and combined with his final four appearances at the 2022 World Cup, it stretched his streak to nine straight World Cup games with a goal, a new all-time record after he had previously drawn level with the existing mark against Austria earlier in the tournament.
The goal carried a second, older piece of history with it. At 39, Messi’s eighth of the tournament matched a record that had stood since the very first World Cup in 1930, most goals scored by an Argentine player in a single edition of the tournament, a mark set by Guillermo Stábile. What makes the comparison striking is the pace at which both men got there. Stábile reached eight goals in a tournament with fewer overall matches, scoring three against Mexico, two against Chile, two more in the semi-final against the United States and a final goal against Uruguay. Messi matched that tally in the same number of games, five, despite the modern tournament’s different structure, opening with hat-tricks against both Algeria and Austria before adding single goals against Jordan, Cape Verde and now Egypt.
Egypt’s inclusion on that scoresheet extends another record entirely. No player in World Cup history has scored against more different national teams than Messi, and the Pharaohs are simply the latest name added to that list.
The goal also pushed his career World Cup tally to 21, stretching his own record as the tournament’s all-time leading scorer even further ahead of the chasing pack.
What stands out most, though, is when in his career this scoring surge has happened. Across his first four World Cups, from 2006 through 2018, Messi managed just six goals total. He then scored seven during Argentina’s title-winning run in 2022, and has already surpassed that with eight goals through five matches in 2026. For a player many expected to be winding down his international career by now, the numbers suggest the opposite, a scoring output that has only accelerated the older he’s gotten, with Argentina’s run to the quarter-finals giving him at least one more chance to add to it.
