Messi vs Ronaldo in 2024: 900 goals and a second copa.

Ronaldo scored 50 in 2024 to Messi's 28, a margin of 22. The year's milestone, on 5 September, is recorded below: it took his career total past 900, a figure no other man in the game's history has reached, and it is the clearest single marker of the distance between his total and everybody else's.

Messi's year was shorter and ended in another trophy. On 14 July, Argentina beat Colombia 1–0 after extra time to retain the Copa América, Lautaro Martínez scoring the only goal; Messi was forced off injured and watched the end of it from the bench. It was his fourth senior international trophy, after the 2021 Copa América, the 2022 Finalissima and the 2022 World Cup.

28 goals is his 17th-best calendar year, and the first full year of his Inter Miami career. Ronaldo's 50 is his eleventh.

Neither was on the 30-man Ballon d'Or shortlist, the first year that had been true of both. Rodri won it, with Vinícius Júnior second.