Being in the semifinals guarantees Argentina to play another game in Qatar, the final or the duel for third place, so Messi has everything in his favor to reach 26 and establish a new record.
Messi arrived in Qatar with 19 games played in the four World Cups he had previously played.
He became throughout the tournament the Argentine player with the most World Cup capsbeating Javier Mascherano (20) and Diego Maradona (21).
In the round of 16, he reached the historic podium with the Italian Paolo Maldini (23) and in the quarterfinals the German Miroslav Klose (24), after which he only had matthaus in front.
In Germany-2006, the edition of his debut, Messi played three games out of the five that his team played. He then played the rest of Argentina’s games: the five of South Africa-2010the seven of Brazil-2014 and the four of Russia-2018to which he adds the now six that the ‘Scaloneta’ wears in Qatar-2022.
– Gelsenkirchen debut –
To find the Messi’s first game in a World Cup In the absolute category, we must go back to June 16, 2006, when Argentina faced Serbia and Montenegro on the second day of the group stage in Gelsenkirchen (Germany).
Messi started that game as a substitute but came into play in the 75th minute, instead of Maxi Rodríguez, and then signed his team’s sixth goal in the 6-0 victory, already in the 88th minute.
There began a long history for him in the competition, where until now he could never be champion. The closest he came was in Brazil in 2014, where Argentina were beaten 1-0 by Germany after extra time in the Maracanã final.
matthauswho is now 61 years old, yes he could be world championin Italy-1990.
He played his 25 World Cup matches spread over five editions: two in Spain-1982seven in Mexico-1986seven in Italy-1990five in United States-1994 and four in France-1998.
Messi had already equaled another record held by Matthäus -and another group of players- in Qatar, the number of final phases played in World Cups, with five.
In number of goals, in addition, ‘Leo’ reached 10 and now shares with Gabriel Batistuta the honor of being the highest scoring Argentine player in the tournament. The Paris Saint-Germain star had arrived in the emirate with six goals.
However, he is still far from the absolute goal record, which is Miroslav Klose with 16.
The entrance Messi equals the record of games played in World Cups was first published on newspaper TODAY.
