Messi reaches 38 goals in finals with strike against Cruz Azul in Campeones Cup

It was the same scene all over again: the ball, a gap between defenders, and Messi finishing it off as if he had all the time in the world. This time it came against Cruz Azul, in the Campeones Cup final, with a goal that ended up deciding the match 1-0 in favor of Inter Miami. And it wasn't just any goal: it was number 38 of his career in finals, a mark no one else in the history of soccer can claim.

The number has been building for a while now, but it's worth pausing on it because it's not easy to wrap your head around: 38 goals spread across four different clubs and national teams (the Argentine national team, Barcelona, Paris Saint-Germain and Inter Miami) over the course of two decades. It all started far, far away from the European nights that made him a legend: it was at the 2005 U20 World Cup, when a teenage Messi scored twice against Nigeria to claim the youth title. Twenty years passed between that final and the one against Cruz Azul.

With the senior national team, the list has a special chapter: on December 18, 2022, in the final of the World Cup in Qatar, he delivered a brace against France in one of the most memorable matches of his career. In total, he played 11 finals with the Albiceleste and scored in 4 of them.

That said, if there's one place where these numbers really take off, it's Barcelona. There he played 31 finals, won 23 titles and scored 31 goals, with separate chapters for the Champions League (4 goals in finals) and the Club World Cup (2). During his brief spell at PSG he also added to the tally: he scored in his only final there, against Nantes, in the 2022 French Super Cup. And now with Inter Miami, before this goal against Cruz Azul, he had already opened his account in the 2023 Leagues Cup final against Nashville SC.

The usual victims

There are teams that should already be afraid just seeing his name on the list of opponents. Athletic Club is by far the side that has suffered the most: 9 goals across various finals. Behind them come Sevilla (7) and Real Madrid (5). On the Argentine side, only two clubs know that bitter feeling: Estudiantes de La Plata and River Plate, the only Argentine teams to have conceded a Messi goal in a final.

The goal against Cruz Azul, then, simply adds another line to a story that already seemed impossible to keep extending. And yet there's Messi, at his age, still finding a way to show up exactly when the match needs him to. The question that lingers is a simple one: how many more finals does he have left to play?