Lionel Messi continues to prove, match after match, that he’s Argentina’s most important player. The captain scored his team’s opening goal in the 2026 World Cup Round of 32 clash against Cape Verde, giving Argentina a partial lead and putting them on course for the next round.
After roughly 30 minutes of Cape Verde showing a solid defense, Lisandro Martinez placed an excellent through ball that Messi received inside the box, controlling it before unleashing a powerful shot that left Vozinha with no chance.
With that strike, the Argentine legend moves into the lead as this edition’s top scorer with seven goals, and extends his own record as the all-time leading scorer in World Cup history with 20 goals.
Messi extends his own record to eight straight World Cup matches with a goal
Messi’s strike against Cape Verde wasn’t just about padding his all-time tally — it also stretched a record that already stood alone in World Cup history heading into this match.
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The Argentine captain had already set the mark for most consecutive World Cup matches scored in, and today’s goal extended it further, now standing at eight consecutive matches, a run that began during Argentina’s title-winning campaign in Qatar, where he scored in each of the final four matches.
Adding more records to Messi, with this goal he also became the first player ever to score in every possible round of the World Cup: Matchday 1, Matchday 2, and Matchday 3 of the group stage, the Round of 32, the Round of 16, the quarterfinals, the semifinals, and the final.
