Cristiano Ronaldo is now the highest scoring international player currently active, taking his tally to 68 goals with two strikes against Latvia. The retirement of Robbie Keane (68 goals) and Zlatan Ibrahimovic (62 goals) from international football has meant that Leo Messi is now second in the list of active players, with 56 goals, ahead of Wayne Rooney.
The Portuguese superstar could have pulled ahead further but missed a penalty against Latvia, with William Carvalho and Bruno Alves also netting in a 4-1 win. Barcelona superstar Neymar Jr. recently racked up 50 goals, and has the second best scoring rate apart from Ali Ashfaq of Maldives.
Here is the list of the highest-scoring active players:
| # | Name | Nation | Goals | Caps | GPG |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Cristiano Ronaldo | Portugal | 68 | 136 | 0.50 |
| 2 | Lionel Messi | Argentina | 56 | 115 | 0.49 |
| 3 | Wayne Rooney | England | 53 | 119 | 0.44 |
| 4 | Ali Ashfaq | Maldives | 52 | 77 | 0.68 |
| 5 | Clint Dempsey | United States | 52 | 130 | 0.40 |
| 6 | Sunil Chhetri | India | 51 | 91 | 0.56 |
| 7 | Neymar | Brazil | 50 | 74 | 0.67 |
| 8 | Robin van Persie | Netherlands | 50 | 101 | 0.50 |
| 9 | Edin Dzeko | Bosnia | 49 | 82 | 0.59 |
Cristiano Ronaldo has a far way to go to reach Iran legend Ali Daei’s record of 109 goals scored, with Ronaldo in 15th spot in the all-time list. Note that the goals above include goals in friendlies - when it comes to purely competitive games Ronaldo is much closer.
2 – Ronaldo is 2nd in the list of all-time players with most competitive goals, netting 52 goals, a distant second to Ali Daei on 87. Miroslav Klose is third with 48 competitive goals.
4 – Ronaldo has only scored 4 out of the 10 penalties he has taken in 2016.
12 – Cristiano Ronaldo has scored 12 goals in his last 11 games for country and club.
There were plenty of interesting stats around the rest of the world as well:
2009 – The last time Belgium lost in a qualification match was against Estonia.
14 – Belgium have gone 14 games unbeaten in qualifying matches, with just 2 draws and 12 wins.
2005 – Belgium’s 8-1 win over Estonia was their biggest since an 8-0 win over San Marino in 2005.
11 – Romelu Lukaku has scored a stunning 11 times in his last 13 games for Belgium.
2001 – Memphis Depay is the 1st substitute since Ruud van Nistelrooy to score a brace for Netherlands.
874 – The last time Memphis Depay scored for Netherlands was in June, 2014 – a stunning 874 days ago.
