Messi World Cup photo’s battle to be biggest Instagram post

He may have reached the zenith of his chosen profession by becoming a World Cup winner with Argentina, but now Lionel Messi must take on the final boss in his quest to become the true GOAT. And no, we’re not talking about his era-defining soccer rivalry with Cristiano Ronaldo.

51mChris Wright

15hESPN

2dGabriele Marcotti

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Messi is locked in battle with — and you’ll like this — a photograph of an egg in the race to become the subject of Instagram’s most-liked post ever. An image of the 35-year-old hoisting the World Cup trophy aloft is up against an image of a single egg which, as of Tuesday morning, has garnered almost 56 million likes on the social media site.

The photo shared by Messi captioned “CAMPEONES DEL MUNDO!!!!!!!” has attracted, at the current count, 58 million likes since it was first uploaded on Sunday, leading him to poach top spot of the all-time list. However, the lead has been swapped back and forth as some Insta users have mobilised in a bid to prevent Messi from beating the egg — so to speak.

The egg image is the only post shared by the anonymous Instagram handle responsible, simply named “@world_record_egg.” The photo was first uploaded almost four years ago in a bid to beat the then-world record (18 million likes) set by Kylie Jenner.

Messi’s World Cup post had around 51 million likes on Tuesday morning after the egg — perhaps aided by an influx of likes from Ronaldo fans — surged to the 55m mark. However, since then Messi has raced back into the lead. It remains to be seen if the Paris Saint-Germain star will now open up a lead at the top, or if the egg supporters can scramble for a fresh assault on the “like” button.

According to Wikipedia (a dangerous phrase if ever there was one), Messi dominates the list of most-liked Instagram posts ever as he boasts eight posts in the overall top 20, while his Portuguese rival has only three.

Interestingly, the two stars combined for a huge total of 74.5m likes (Ronaldo 42m, Messi 32.5m) and counting when, on the eve of the World Cup, they each posted the same image of the two of them playing a game of chess on a Louis Vuitton case in an a marketing stunt for the luxury fashion brand.

Perhaps Ronaldo can still take solace in the fact that he has comfortably more followers (519m) on Instagram than Messi (402m). In fact, Ronaldo’s account is the most-followed on the entire platform.

However, Messi fans might rightly argue that an actual, real-life World Cup winner’s medal in the trophy cabinet quite possibly trumps that particular feat.