Lamine Yamal knocks 105 days off Mbappe record that Max Dowman could smash again | OneFootball

Lamine Yamal has knocked 105 days off a Kylian Mbappe Champions League goalscoring record in the season they go head to head for honours across the board.

Yamal became the youngest ever player to score 10 Champions League goals at 18 years and 245 days when he netted in Barcelona’s dismantling of Newcastle United on Wednesday night.

That broke a record that has stood for eight years as Mbappe reached the 10-goal mark at the age of 18 years and 350 days back in 2018 when his strike for PSG against Bayern Munich could not prevent a 3-1 defeat.

The Frenchman can still boast that his first 10 Champions League goals came in just 15 games for first club Monaco, and PSG, while Lamal has needed 31 games to reach the milestone.

Extraordinarily, Mbappe and Yamal are the only two players in Champions League history to score 10 goals before the age of 19, with Raul netting six for Real Madrid, future Stoke legend Bojan Krkic scoring four for Barcelona and Rodrygo matching that tally for Real Madrid, in the process becoming the second-youngest scorer of a Champions League hat-trick.

The youngest ever player to score a Champions League hat-trick was of course Raul at 18 years and 114 days, which means that record is already beyond the ageing Lamal.

That hat-trick record could still be in the sights of Arsenal’s Max Dowman, who could become the youngest ever Champions League winner if Arsenal triumph this season.

But a more realistic target will be this new record from Yamal. At the age of just 16, Dowman had until the end of the 2027/28 Champions League campaign to break this 10-goal mark from the Spaniard.

Yamal has been breaking records all season and earlier this month he reached the 50-goal mark for club and country and was three years younger than Ronaldo when he scored his 50th goal, and two years younger than Messi.

This was not the only record broken as Barcelona beat Newcastle United on Wednesday night, with veteran striker Robert Lewandowski scoring against his 41st different opponent to move past Lionel Messi on 40 teams. Ronaldo is trailing in their wake with 38.

Lewandowski now has 109 Champions League goals in 142 games, giving him an identical ratio to Ronaldo of 0.77 goals per game.

Back in August, Lewandowski foresaw this surge in form from Yamal, saying: “Lamine, we can no longer say that he is a child. He is an adult because he just turned 18. He is a great player and an excellent guy off the field.

“This year he will play even better, because he also has more experience. Lamine will play at a higher level every season.”

Elsewhere, both Mo Salah and Harry Kane reached the 50-goal mark, though the English striker reached that mark in 31 fewer games.