{"id":6489,"date":"2026-07-19T12:08:24","date_gmt":"2026-07-19T12:08:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/?p=6489"},"modified":"2026-07-19T12:08:25","modified_gmt":"2026-07-19T12:08:25","slug":"fifa-world-cup-golden-boot-race-can-messi-overtake-mbappe-in-the-final","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/?p=6489","title":{"rendered":"FIFA World Cup Golden Boot Race: Can Messi Overtake Mbapp\u00e9 in the Final?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>NEW YORK:<\/strong> As Argentina prepare to face Spain in the FIFA World Cup final today, another major battle will unfold alongside the race for the championship\u2014the contest for the tournament&#8217;s prestigious <strong>Golden Boot<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">France&#8217;s <strong>Kylian Mbapp\u00e9<\/strong> currently leads the scoring charts with <strong>10 goals<\/strong>, having completed his tournament campaign.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Argentina captain <strong>Lionel Messi<\/strong> has scored <strong>8 goals<\/strong> so far and still has one final opportunity to surpass the French star.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">To finish ahead of Mbapp\u00e9 outright, Messi will need to score <strong>a hat-trick<\/strong> in the final, taking his tally to 11 goals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">If Messi scores <strong>two goals<\/strong>, he would draw level with Mbapp\u00e9 on 10 goals. In that case, the Golden Boot would be decided by the first tiebreaker\u2014<strong>assists<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Both players currently have <strong>four assists<\/strong> each. Therefore, if Messi scores twice, he would also need to register <strong>at least one assist<\/strong> in the final to move ahead of Mbapp\u00e9.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">If both goals and assists remain tied, FIFA&#8217;s next tiebreaker is <strong>fewer minutes played<\/strong> during the tournament.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Mbapp\u00e9 has played <strong>769 minutes<\/strong> in the competition, while Messi has featured for <strong>712 minutes<\/strong> before the final. However, if Messi plays the entire final, his total minutes will increase, potentially affecting that tiebreaker.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">With the World Cup trophy and the Golden Boot both at stake, all eyes will be on Messi as he attempts to lead Argentina to glory while chasing yet another individual milestone in his remarkable career.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>NEW YORK: As Argentina prepare to face Spain in the FIFA World Cup final today, another major battle will unfold alongside the race for the..<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6490,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6489","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/paksouch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/438317_2996294_updates-1.jpg",700,400,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/paksouch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/438317_2996294_updates-1-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/paksouch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/438317_2996294_updates-1-300x171.jpg",300,171,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/paksouch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/438317_2996294_updates-1.jpg",700,400,false],"large":["https:\/\/paksouch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/438317_2996294_updates-1.jpg",700,400,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/paksouch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/438317_2996294_updates-1.jpg",700,400,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/paksouch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/438317_2996294_updates-1.jpg",700,400,false]},"author_info":{"info":["admin"]},"category_info":"<a href=\"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/?cat=6\" rel=\"category\">Sports<\/a>","tag_info":"Sports","comment_count":"0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6489","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6489"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6489\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6491,"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6489\/revisions\/6491"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6490"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6489"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6489"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6489"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}