Lionel Messi Top La Liga Scorer for 6th Time, Wins 5th European Golden Shoe

Barcelona ace Lionel Messi has further engraved his name in the Spanish history books after finishing the season as La Liga's top scorer and adding a fifth European Golden Shoe to his list of achievements.

No player in Europe scored more league goals than Messi's 34 in La Liga this term, netting him a sixth Pichichi Trophy and yielding the top spot in Europe's goal hunt, too.

Messi has now won back-to-back Pichichi awards for the second time in his career and is two clear of Real Madrid rival Cristiano Ronaldo, who now hasn't topped La Liga's scoring ranks since 2014-15. 

The Argentinian came off the bench during Sunday's 1-0 win over Real Sociedad but was unable to add to his goal count, as Philippe Coutinho's wonder strike was the difference between the pair in a 1-0 win for Barca.

ESPN.com's Samuel Marsden noted how Messi's figures could have been even higher were he not so unselfish, as he also managed to contribute a healthy number of assists while taking the top-scorer gong:

It's that kind of unselfishness that has led the Blaugrana to pick up another league crown. In contrast, Ronaldo has made only five assists this season to go along with his 26 goals.

The European Golden Shoe is decided via a points system in which the number of goals a player scores is multiplied based on the difficulty of the league in which one plays. With two points per La Liga goal, Messi's 68 points bested Liverpool's Mohamed Salah (64 points on 32 goals) and Tottenham Hotspur's Harry Kane (60 points on 30 goals). Ronaldo's 52 points ranked eighth.

That Messi has won it on five occasions is evidence of his evergreen quality when it comes to putting the ball in the back of the net. Having been level with Ronaldo on four European Golden Shoe awards each, Messi is now clear of Real's poster boy, too, per Squawka:

Despite this being the joint-lowest goal tally with which Messi has won either the Pichichi Trophy or the Golden Shoe, the hand it played in bringing Barca a league and Copa del Rey double was the difference.

Another season, another campaign in which Messi continues to bring accolades on both the teamwide and individual scales back to Catalonia, underlining his place as the greatest player of all time.