The 22:00 UTC meme board: 100-year Messi fan, Klose deadpan, and Mbappe left alone
A late June 22 World Cup meme board led by the 100-year-old Messi fan sign, Messi's all-time scoring record, Klose's dry congratulations, BBC's first-person goal simulation, Zlatan's self-own, and Mbappe getting too much space against Iraq.
A 100-year-old in the stands held up a "100 YEAR OLD MESSI FAN" sign while Argentina were already 2-0 up in stoppage time. That is the board. Everybody else was just posting around it.
This late window runs from the previous Meme Watch cutoff to 22:00 UTC on June 22. It is heavy on Argentina-Austria because Messi turned one match into a record chase, a tribute reel, and a comments-section war over whether anyone should be allowed to mark all-time greats.
1. The 100-year Messi fan won the image round
The broadcast still itself did all the work: a smiling Argentina supporter, scoreboard frozen at 96:43, holding a handwritten sign reading "100 YEAR OLD MESSI FAN." The sign appeared during Argentina's 2-0 win over Austria and became the cleanest late-window image gag: no caption needed, just a centenarian outlasting defender after defender. 1
Posted by u/Mulderre91, the r/soccer image thread was at 6,183 points, 144 comments, and 205 shares when pulled, with a 96.9% upvote ratio. The comments mostly did the obvious thing and then did it well: "I too will still support him when he's 100," one user wrote, while another imagined the fan watching a Maradona successor arrive as a "new boy" and still being around 20 years later for this version of Messi. 1
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2. The record book updated twice, then the discourse arrived
Transfermarkt's all-time World Cup scoring table now lists Lionel Messi at 18 goals, ahead of Miroslav Klose on 16, Ronaldo on 15, and Gerd Müller on 14. 2 The r/soccer record thread started earlier in the match, when the board was still celebrating Messi moving to 17; by the end of Argentina 2-0 Austria, he had added another one. 3
The thread was not just reverence. It had 7,162 points and 452 comments, but the replies split into three lanes: Messi GOAT shorthand, Klose appreciation, and a format-change audit. One commenter argued the expanded tournament should affect how the record is read; another pushed back that the World Cup has changed formats many times since 1930. 3
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3. Klose delivered the driest possible concession speech
Süddeutsche Zeitung published Klose's reaction at 19:02 UTC: "I have always said that Messi isn't half bad," he said, before calling Messi the best footballer of all time and adding, "Congrats, champion!" The same report says Messi scored goals 17 and 18 in the 2-0 win over Austria. 4
That quote became its own r/soccer item, posted by u/Halo1592, and it landed at 2,620 points and 92 comments. The reaction was tiny but very on-brand: "Klassik Klose," "Danke Klose," and one perfect two-word read, "So german." 5
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4. BBC's Messi-cam turned the goal into a video-game replay
BBC's 3D first-person simulation of Messi's record-breaking goal gave the timeline a different toy: not another highlight clip, but a little tactical amusement park ride. The r/soccer post by u/Sad-Concentrate168 drew 2,397 points, 177 comments, and 401 shares. 6
The comments split exactly how you would hope: some people used the angle to re-litigate a possible foul, one viewer asked how Messi keeps walking into shooting windows, and one user offered the correct product request: "I vote we let Messi wear the ref cam." 6
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5. Zlatan praised Messi and somehow made it about Zlatan
The late-window quote clip from Zlatan Ibrahimovic was framed around Messi's five goals in two games, but the punchline was Zlatan's self-own: "I have zero goals in two World Cups," followed by actual praise and a birthday nod. The r/soccer post by u/razycal970 hit 1,449 points and 86 comments. 7
The thread immediately turned into a slang lab. Comments used "glazing," "aura farmer," and the inevitable Ronaldo stray, but the useful read was simpler: fans noticed that Zlatan being generous about another forward still sounds like Zlatan narrating his own legend. 7
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6. Mbappé got space, and r/soccer treated Iraq like a cautionary tale
France-Iraq gave the board one non-Messi main character. Kylian Mbappé scored in the 14th minute, and the Reddit goal thread by u/West_Agent4651 posted at 21:14 UTC had 2,949 points, 553 comments, and 168 shares. 8
The joke was not complicated: how, exactly, did Iraq give Mbappé that much time at the top of the box? One commenter called him "the protagonist of the world cup"; another asked, "nobody felt like closing him down there? cool." 8
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Quick-hit scraps
- r/footballmemes had a small but clean Messi attention-economy joke. "The four stages of watching Messi" drew 144 points and three comments, with the replies mostly dunking on engagement-bait accounts that pivot from slander to praise as soon as the player starts cooking. 9
- The 7-1 curse meme was legible, but tiny. A Germany/Brazil callback claimed Germany have been cursed since the 2014 Brazil demolition, pointing at the 7-1 loss to Curaçao as karmic bookkeeping. It had one point and no comments, so call it a micro-meme, not a breakout. 10
The late board's short version: Messi owned the room, Klose won the tone contest, BBC accidentally pitched a new coaching toy, and Mbappé reminded everyone that leaving him alone is still a bad business model.
References
- 1Argentina fan in the stands today
reddit.com
- 2World Cup - All-time top goalscorers
transfermarkt.com
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- 4
- 5
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- 7Zlatan Ibrahimovic on Messi's World Cup
reddit.com
- 8France 1 - 0 Iraq - K. Mbappé 14'
reddit.com
- 9The four stages of watching Messi
reddit.com
- 10
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