We don't know if anyone noticed this, but Lionel Messi is pretty good at soccer. He scored a hat trick in Barcelona's 7-0 demolition of Gary Neville's Valencia side Wednesday.
¡GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL!
La pulga con un 3-0 de playstation pero nivel leyenda. Barça golea en 30'. #CopadelRey https://t.co/mQV3UtS8ad
Barcelona just handed Valencia its worst defeat in 23 years. That’s not something to take lightly. In fact, it’s the kind of thing heard before a lot of people get fired. But somehow, amidst all of the goals (four for Luis Suarez, three for Lionel Messi, for a grand total of Barcelona 7, Valencia 0), all of the cries for mercy, and a complete lack of defending, the singularly most embarrassing moment of the night might belong to Barcelona, courtesy of Neymar’s penalty miss against Valencia.
Remember this kid? The one with the heart-wrenching Messi jersey made out of a plastic bag? Well, now that your heart has been wrenched, prepare for it to be warmed.
Lots of people have been working to find this kid. After a hiccup or two, it looks like they've found him. And now a meeting with Lionel Messi himself is in the works.
The little boy's name is Murtaza Ahmadi. He's five years old and lived in a small village in Afghanistan.
As a symbol of Catalonian pride — and for many, Catalonian nationalism — FC Barcelona has a storied yet complicated history with the Copa del Rey, the Spanish equivalent of England’s FA Cup.
Samuel Eto’o and I first met in FIFA 10. I am not ashamed to say this. I was new to the game and he was really fast and could finish. It was a match made in heaven. Not to mention, that this was before I started to follow professional soccer with the eye of someone who writes about the sport for a living. Little did I know then how much of a baller Eto’o really was in real life. I didn’t know that he was on Barcelona before he won the treble for Inter. I didn’t know that he once lined up along side Lionel Messi and Ronaldinho in attack for Barcelona.
Neymar has been making all sorts of headlines recently, which in and of itself is not unusual. He's one of the most famous soccer players in the world. It would be weird if Neymar wasn't making headlines.
The headlines that Neymar is generating at this particular moment, though, are quite interesting, as it seems half of them are reporting that he had talks with Real Madrid regarding a possible move. The other half are, obviously, reporting that hell will freeze over before the young Brazilian engages in such talks with Los Blancos.
Sometimes we forget how truly global soccer's reach is, how extremely footballing superstars have burrowed into the global consciousness. Then we see a picture of a toddler (here we are just guessing) Messi fan wearing a plastic bag painted to look like a Lionel Messi Argentina jersey.
A kid in Iraq .. pic.twitter.com/ZfOEpUCNvw
— Leo Messi (@messi10stats) January 16, 2016
Gerard Pique is from Barcelona, so he knows full well the political and social divides that define the rivalry between the city’s two local clubs: FC Barcelona and Espanyol.
Everyone knows the names of the greats who have taken the field for FC Barcelona over the years, from Messi to Cruyff, from Ronaldo to Iniesta, from Luis Suarez (both of them!) to Neymar, just to name a few. But all too few know the name of the man to whom these legends and all fans of Barcelona owe a huge debt of gratitude: Patrick O’Connell.
If you played sports while growing up, there is a good chance that you had that one friend (hopefully that was you), who was miles ahead of the other kids in terms of skill.
That kid who would nutmeg everybody while playing around with the soccer ball, cross people over and leave them on the floor on the basketball court, or even juke you out of your shoes in a pickup football game. We all went through something like that at some point of our sporting careers.