Lionel Messi scored a direct free-kick to help Barcelona to a 2-1 over Sevilla, extending the club’s unbeaten run to 34 games and getting the Argentine to the 30-goal mark for the eighth consecutive season.
The Catalan side’s streak is now the equal-longest in history for a La Liga side in all competitions, alongside a Real Madrid sequence in 1988-89.
Barca had to do it the hard way, though, coming from behind at home against Sevilla to eventually win 2-1.
Messi’s goals over those 8 seasons:
2008/09 = 38
2009/10 = 47
2010/11 = 53
2011/12 = 73
2012/13 = 60
2013/14 = 41
2014/15 = 58
2015/16 = 30
Messi equalised with a whipped, bending free-kick – his sixth of the season, more than any other player – before setting up Gerard Pique for the winner.
That set-piece stat adds a particularly barbed insult to injury for Cristiano Ronaldo, whose own assumed free-kick brilliance has come into question in recent times.
Ronaldo’s Real Madrid side lost the Madrid derby to rivals Atletico at the weekend and, although it was new boss Zinedine Zidane’s first defeat in charge, the combination of results sees Los Blancos slip a startling 12 points adrift of Barcelona at the La Liga summit in third.
Atletico are now Barca’s nearest rivals for the title as Antoine Griezmann helped Diego Simeone’s side to a 1-0 victory at the Bernabeu.
The result makes Atletico the first-ever visiting side to beat Real on their own patch in three consecutive seasons – another grim statistic in a domestic campaign that is fast unravelling.
Though it were hardly necessary to underscore Real’s plight, Cristiano Ronaldo could not resist making post-match comments naming teammates who he appeared to say were not good enough to help Real Madrid win.
“If everybody was at my level, we’d be top,” the Portuguese told the press.
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