Lionel Messi Scores 500th Career Goal: Breakdown of Barcelona, Argentina Record

Lionel Messi hit yet another incredible milestone on Sunday, as he scored his 500th career goal in Barcelona's 2-1 defeat to Valencia at the Camp Nou.

Bleacher Report UK provided a breakdown of how the superstar scored those goals and the competitions in which he did so, with the majority of his club goals coming in La Liga and the UEFA Champions League:

It also celebrated his magnificent achievement:

His landmark strike was in fact fairly unremarkable, a relatively simple tap-in from Jordi Alba's cross, but as one might expect from a player who has netted 450 times for Barcelona and a further 50 for Argentina, there have been plenty of stunning efforts to light up his highlight reel.

One of his best will be his strike against Athletic Bilbao in last year's Copa del Rey final, in which he picked up the ball near the halfway line, beat no fewer than four players and tucked the ball home with aplomb—a goal that earned him a nomination for 2015's FIFA Puskas Award (Messi at 0:47):

He did that just weeks after doing this to Bayern Munich and Jerome Boateng in the Champions League semi-final:

As Barcelona revealed on Twitter, the 28-year-old has been terrorising defenders with frightening regularity since his youth:

Though he has not won a major honour with Argentina save for an Olympic gold medal, the Albiceleste captain has been similarly prolific for his country in 107 caps. Here are some of his best in an Argentina shirt, including three at the 2014 FIFA World Cup:

BBC Sport revealed how many came from open play compared with free-kicks and penalties, along with the periods in games in which he most regularly found the net:

As it revealed, Messi has reserved most of his goals for the end of each half, likely thanks to his electric pace and phenomenally quick feet taking full advantage of defenders' tired legs.

According to BBC Sport, Barca team-mate Dani Alves is the player who has provided Messi with the most assists, the Brazilian having set him up on 42 occasions. Unsurprisingly, long-time Blaugrana playmakers Andres Iniesta and Xavi Hernandez are close behind with 33 and 31 assists, respectively.

Sky Sports' Nick Wright and Nick Pepper provided the distribution of his goals across each competition in which he has featured:

Competition	Goals
La Liga	309
Champions League	83
Copa del Rey	39
Spanish Super Cup	11
European Super Cup	3
World Club Cup	5
Copa America	3
International Friendlies	27
World Cup	5
World Cup Qualifiers	15

While Messi will undoubtedly be delighted to have reached such a phenomenal milestone, his desire to win is such that he would probably have preferred not to score on Sunday but his team win, as the defeat puts Barcelona's title challenge in serious jeopardy, and he'd likely trade in his Argentina goals for a World Cup winner's medal.

If he can remain injury-free, as he has for the majority of his career, he could well score hundreds more goals and enjoy plenty more titles to come.