Magical Messi punishes Juventus
Lionel Messi scored either side of halftime as Barcelona brushed aside Juventus 3-0 in their opening Champions League Group D clash on Tuesday night. Messi made the breakthrough in the final minute of the first half, the first time the playmaker had scored against Gianluigi Buffon in his career.
Ivan Rakitic then doubled the Catalans’ lead with a composed finish 11 minutes after half-time, before Messi completed the scoring 21 minutes from time with his 515th goal for the club.
Both goalkeepers were called into making impressive early stops, with first Marc-Andre ter Stegen getting fingertips to Mattia De Sciglio’s well-struck effort, before Buffon did equally well to palm Luis Suarez’s effort over the bar.
However, just as it looked as though the first half would end goalless, Barca struck through that man Messi, who played a neat onetwo on the edge of the area with Suarez, before placing a low left-footed effort into the bottom right-hand corner of the net.
The home side nearly added to their score when the irrepressible Messi crashed a thunderous effort against the inside of the post seven minutes into the second period.
That close shave was soon forgotten, though, when Barcelona added a second moments later.
Suarez, back from injury, released Messi down the right and with acres of space to himself, the Argentina international cut inside, before seeing his goal-bound effort cleared from off the line by Stefano Sturaro.
The substitute’s clearance fell straight at the feet of Rakitic, however, with the midfielder making no mistake with a cool finish. And the home side then ended the game as a contest after a lightning counter ended with Messi leaving Buffon on his behind and the ball in the back of the net as he scored his 96th Champions League goal to gain revenge for losing to Juve in last season’s quarter-finals.
Stats
Buffon has equalled the Champions League record for most appearances by an Italian player with 109 (level with Paolo Maldini)
Messi has now scored against 27 different clubs in the Champions League - only three players have ever scored against more (Raul 33, Cristiano Ronaldo 31, Zlatan Ibrahimovic 29, Karim Benzema also 27)
Juventus lost a Champions League group stage game by three goals for only the second time - the other was a 1-4 home defeat to Bayern Munich in December 2009