Before Lionel Messi, Telmo Zarra held the La Liga all-time scoring record with 251 goals. The Athletic Bilbao striker’s mark stood for nearly six decades before Messi surpassed it in 2014.
Zarra played in Spain’s top division from 1940 to 1955, spending most of his career with Athletic Bilbao. He scored 251 league goals in 278 appearances and won the Pichichi Trophy, awarded to La Liga’s leading scorer, six times.
His record was especially notable because Zarra played in a lower-scoring era and missed much of the 1951–52 season with a serious leg injury. In 1950–51, he scored 38 league goals in 30 matches, a Spanish record at the time; Hugo Sánchez later matched that total in 1989–90.
Messi broke the record on 22 November 2014, scoring a hat-trick against Sevilla to reach 253 goals. Messi eventually extended the record to 474, but Zarra remains one of Spanish football’s defining historic goalscorers.