Madrid (AFP)
With his goal scored on a service from Pedri (65th) on Tuesday evening on the 15th day of La Liga against Valladolid, Lionel Messi overtook Pelé to become the only record holder for the number of goals scored in one and the same club, with 644 goals for FC Barcelona.
Lionel Messi had equaled "King Pelé" after scoring in a 2-2 draw against Valencia on Saturday, but the Argentine overtook the Brazilian with the new goal on Tuesday night in Valladolid.
Messi (33) has scored 644 goals in 749 official matches for Barça according to the club (or one goal in every 1.16 games), while the Brazilian has scored 643 goals in 757 games for neighboring Sao Paulo, Santos FC (i.e. 1 goal every 1.17 matches) where he played 18 years from 1956 to 1974 (before leaving for Cosmos in New York).
The six-time Ballon d'Or, six-time Golden Boot and finalist for the FIFA "The Best" 2020 Prize on Thursday is by far the top scorer in Barça history (ahead of the 230 goals of Cesar Rodriguez), the top scorer in the world. history of the Spanish Championship (451 goals, ahead of Cristiano Ronaldo's 311), and the player who won the most titles with the Catalan club (34, including 4 Champions Leagues).
"Congratulations on your historic record, Lionel. But above all, congratulations on your great career at Barcelona. Stories like ours, love stories for the same club that last so long, will be increasingly rare in football. . I admire you a lot, Leo Messi, "reacted the Brazilian legend on Instagram on Saturday evening.
Messi now sits alone at the top of this record, but will still have to wait to hang "O Rei" (the king, in Portuguese) on other records.
With between 757 and 767 goals scored in official matches throughout his career according to sources, Pelé is still ahead of Messi (714) and Cristiano Ronaldo (754) in the total number of goals in a career, selections included.
Pelé, he claimed more than a thousand goals scored ... by counting all the matches played, official or not.
However, if we stick to the official matches, the Brazilian seems to be ahead of the Austrian and Czechoslovak striker Josef Bican, who had scored 805 goals.
Pelé also remains the top scorer of all the selections of the South American confederation with his 77 goals scored in the Brazilian jersey, six ahead of Messi's 71 with Argentina.
© 2020 AFP