Salah held up a 70 for Egypt, but FIFA's count says 68 and Hossam Hassan's record stands

Mohamed Salah scored twice in the last minutes of Egypt's 5-0 win over Malawi on Friday in Cairo, and his teammates mobbed him at the final whistle as the country's new all-time leading scorer. Salah then posted a photo of himself holding a sheet of paper with "70" written on it. FIFA's own count says he has 68, which would leave Hossam Hassan's record of 69 standing for at least a few more days.

Egypt were already 3-0 up at halftime through Nasser Maher, Omar Marmoush and Mohamed Hany, in the first game for new coach Ali Maher. Salah had been kept out for 84 minutes before he headed in a cross from substitute Ibrahim Adel at the far post. Deep in stoppage time, Hamza Abdelkarim was brought down by Malawi goalkeeper George Chikooka, and Salah chipped the penalty down the middle, Panenka style.

The brace ended a four-game international drought that went back to his goal against New Zealand at the World Cup. The win leaves Egypt top of Group B in Africa Cup of Nations qualifying with seven points from three games, three ahead of Angola.

ESPN, AFP and the French stats account Stats du Foot all credited Salah with 70 international goals in 123 appearances, one more than Hassan scored between 1985 and 2006. His club, Trabzonspor, congratulated him on social media for the fourth and fifth goals.

The gap goes back to 2013, early in Salah's international career, when he scored twice in a 10-0 friendly win over Swaziland, now Eswatini. Then-coach Bob Bradley made 10 substitutions that day, more than the limit for an official international match, and the game never appeared in Egypt's results list on FIFA's website.

Transfermarkt has Salah on 68. FIFA confused things further with an article after the New Zealand goal that gave him 68 at that point, which some read as proof he reached 70 on Friday. According to Goal, FIFA then corrected that figure to 66, which puts his tally after Malawi at 68, one short of Hassan.

The numbers matter more than usual because of who holds the record. Hassan was fired as Egypt coach last week, even though he had taken the team to the 2026 World Cup. Goal reported that the two fell out after Hassan took Salah off after 60 minutes against Angola in the opening qualifier, amid reports of a halftime dressing-room outburst. Salah left the camp and didn't travel for the next game against South Sudan, and Egyptian FA president Hani Abo Rida flew to Turkey to try to calm things down before Hassan was let go.

Egyptian media were more measured about the performance itself. Sportsdunia gave him a 7 out of 10, citing four key passes and 16 lost possessions.

The question may settle itself soon. Egypt play Malawi again on Tuesday, away from home. Under FIFA's count, one goal pulls the 34-year-old level with Hassan and two would make him Egypt's outright top scorer, with no asterisk about a friendly from 2013.