World Cup 2026: Lionel Messi establishes commanding lead in Golden Boot race with record-breaking goals

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June 22, 2026

On June 22, 2026

The stars have been out at the 2026 World Cup. We’re now midway through group play, and there are a host of multi-goal scorers.

We’ve been tracking the race for the Golden Boot, the award that’s given to the tournament’s top goal scorer. Assists are used as a tiebreaker if two or more players have the same goal total.

Lionel Messi retook the top spot early in Argentina‘s knockout round-clinching victory against Austria on Monday. Shortly after missing a penalty kick, the Argentine legend drilled a left-footer into the bottom-left corner of the net to overtake Germany‘s Miroslav Klose with his record 17th World Cup goal. Then, just before the match wrapped, Messi scored again. He’s accounted for all five of his country’s goals and has now surpassed Brazil‘s Marta for the most goals (18) any player’s scored in the World Cup, men’s or women’s.

As of Monday afternoon, Messi’s one of 22 players with at least two goals in the tournament so far.

World Cup 2026: Daily schedule | Group schedule, results | Standings

2026 World Cup Golden Boot race

Messi is now firmly ahead of Germany’s Deniz Undav, who scored twice on Saturday to run his tournament total to three goals. Undav also has a pair of assists under his belt. He’s done all of that as a sub, by the way.

Both Messi and Canada’s Jonathan David have authored hat tricks. Messi’s came in Argentina’s opener against Algeria, while David’s three-goal showcase arrived amid Canada’s first-ever World Cup win, a 6-0 trouncing of Qatar.

England’s Harry Kane bagged a record-tying brace against Croatia last Wednesday. In a rematch of the teams’ 2018 World Cup semifinal, he scored on a penalty kick and a set-piece header to tie Gary Lineker as the Three Lions’ all-time leading goal scorer at the World Cup.

Last Tuesday — the same day Messi sparkled with three goals and France’s Kylian Mbappé began defending his 2022 Golden Boot with a pair of goals in a win over Senegal — Norway’s Erling Haaland found the back of the net twice in his long-awaited World Cup debut, piloting his country to a convincing victory against Iraq.

You can relive the nine combined opening-match goals scored by Messi, Kane, Mbappé and Haaland if you missed any of those performances.

We’ll be tracking the Golden Boot race throughout the tournament on this page, so bookmark it and come back to see who’s on top.