By David Awopetu
Barcelona’s Lionel Messi has overtaken Brazil legend Pele to become the player to score the most goals for a single club after taking his tally to 644 on Tuesday.
Messi created the first goal when his cross was headed in by Clement Lenglet and started the move for the second, finished off by Martin Braithwaite.
The record-breaking goal came in the second half of Barca’s 3-0 win at Valladolid, with Messi taking the ball in stride off a nifty flick from Pedri for a finish into the corner of the net.
Brazil great, Pele scored 643 goals in 19 seasons for Santos in his homeland between 1956 and 1974.
Messi, who scored his first goal for Barca in 2005 and has gone on to win 10 La Liga titles and four Champions Leagues, is out of contract at the end of the season and able to talk to other clubs from January.
In August, he said he wanted to exercise a clause in his deal which he said allowed him to leave on a free transfer, but Barcelona refused, saying his 700m euro (£624m) release clause had to be met.
Earlier this week, Messi said the incident caused him to have “a very bad time in the summer”, although he was in superb form against Valladolid on Tuesday, inspiring a win that took Barcelona back up to fifth, eight points behind leaders Atletico Madrid.
Marc-Andre Ter Stegen made two one-handed saves to deny Fabian Orellana and Kike Perez, preserving Barcelona’s clean sheet.
Gerd Muller came closest to matching Pele’s one-club goal-scoring feat. The former Germany international netted 565 times for Bayern Munich between 1964 and 1979. The top five is completed by Fernando Peyroteo (Sporting CP 1937-49, 544 goals) and Josef Bican (Slavia Prague 1950s, 534 goals).
“When I started to play football, I never thought I would break any record. Especially not the record held by Pele that I now hold,” Messi wrote on Instagram after Tuesday’s game. “I can only give thanks to everyone that has helped me throughout the years, my teammates, my family, my friends and everyone that supports me every day.”
