Ten years ago, Lionel Messi destroyed Bayer Leverkusen in the Champions League and tonight – showed no mercy toward Estonia in a friendly match. For the second time in his career, Messi scored five goals in one match. Back in 2012 for the victory of Barcelona 7-1 over the German side, and tonight he scored all five for 5-0 of his national team against Estonia in Pamplona.Although Spain are playing a Nations League match in the Czech Republic at the same time, a large number of spectators came to Osasuna Stadium to watch the Gauchos, who a few days ago were convincing against Italy in the match between the South American and European champions – 3-0 in La Finalissima.Those who found themselves in the stands of El Sadara witnessed quite a show – as they saw a dominant performance of Argentina. Regardless of the fact that the rival was not of equal reputation, Lionel Scaloni’s team pushed it to the max, even though it was an unimportant game after the tiring club season has just ended for most of them.It took Leo Messi only 47 minutes to reach the hat-trick. He started the series of goals from the penalty spot in the 9th minute, then in the 45th he scored nicely after a nice pass from Papu Gomez, and soon after returning from the break, he was precise once again. Julian Alvarez saved the ball with skillful dribbles and put it to the right side to Molina, whose first shot found the captain ten meters from the opponent’s goal and Messi sent the ball into the net.The former goal scorer of Barcelona, from last season of Paris Saint-Germain, made it 4-0 with a cunning reaction in the 71st minute. He took advantage of the confusion of the Estonians, who stopped thinking that the referee would award a foul. The final 5-0 was set by the great Messi after a carom in front of the Estonian goal in the 76th minute. Several times, the defenders of the opposing team managed to block the shots of the Argentines, but Messi’s shot was too much.##EDITORS_CHOICE##With these goals, the trophy-winning 34-year-old from Rosario (on June 24, Messi turns 35) further advanced on the eternal list of the best scorers in the national team. He overtook the famous Hungarian Ferenc Puskas by two goals and reached fourth place with 86 goals. Ahead of him are Mohtar Dahari from Malaysia (89), Alli Dei from Iran (109) and Cristiano Ronaldo, whose match for Portugal against Switzerland is in progress, and he has already scored two goals and is now at 117.With another great performance, the Argentines have shown that they take the preparations for the World Cup in Qatar extremely seriously. Saudi Arabia, Mexico and Poland should not be rivals that will disrupt their calculations when it comes to the group stage of the competition.
