MADRID, 29 Mar. (EUROPA PRESS) –
Leo Messi was once again the great protagonist of a new victory for the Argentine team by scoring a hat-trick in the resounding 7-0 win against modest Curaçao on Tuesday, managing to overcome the 100-goal barrier as an international.
The striker from Rosario arrived at this second friendly of the break, another party in the Argentine town of Santiago del Estero where the ‘Albiceleste’ was honored for winning their world title, with the counter at 99 goals after their spectacular foul against Panama , which had helped him reach 800 goals in his career. With 102, he is now 20 behind Portuguese Cristiano Ronaldo, the all-time international goalscorer, and seven behind Iranian Ali Daei.
Lionel Scaloni’s team wanted to return the affection received once again by their passionate fans and barely relaxed despite facing the number 86 in the FIFA world ranking, who had already received a ‘hand’ at half-time.
Even so, Curaçao held out for 20 minutes until they conceded the first goal, the work of the Paris Saint-Germain player, who from then on was completely unleashed along with his teammates, who in the following 17 minutes shook their rival with hardly any find opposition and scored four more goals.
Nico González made it 2-0 shortly after and then came two more from Messi to add his ninth hat-trick with the team, with an assist from Enzo Fernández in between, to close the resounding 5-0 with which they reached the rest.
Scaloni, despite the score and the stretch of the season, kept the whole game at ’10’, although he no longer saw a goal in a second half where the triple world champion already loosened something and goalkeeper Room avoided a bigger win. Even so, he increased the score in the final minutes through Ángel di María and Sevilla’s Gonzalo Montiel.