Messi starred as Argentina picked up a 2-1
victory in the last 16 to book a quarter-final against the Netherlands on
Friday. The Paris Saint-Germain star opened the scoring with a typical Messi
goal, exchanging passes before firing a curling left-footed shot into the
bottom corner.
Argentina went 2-0 up thanks to a mistake
from Mat Ryan which was seized upon by Julian Alvarez before Craig Goodwin’s
deflected effort made things interesting. Messi set up two brilliant chances
for Lautaro Martinez to make the game safe, but the substitute could not take
either and Garang Kuol nearly made them pay with a late opportunity for the
Socceroos.
Messi was at his exhilarating best,
drifting past players with ease while knitting play together for his side. His
goal was his 987th in his 1,000th career match and had Ferdinand purring in the
BBC studio after the full-time whistle.
“Messi has put on the best individual
performance we’ve seen at this World Cup so far, by a mile,” Ferdinand said.
“Showboating, laying shots on a plate for teammates, and the crowd – it was
almost god-like, after every single thing he does.”
Alan Shearer added: “What a second half
performance from him, and the first half with his goal. We’ve spoken about his
ability many times before, the hunger and desire and ability to run with the
ball attracts so many defenders to him which then frees up his teammates.
“The story is on him but what a performance
from Australia to come back into the game and that sort of epitomises them in
this tournament. Lucky goal, but they gave it a right good go right until the
end of their tournament. It could have gone to extra time if not for a
fantastic save, but the best team won.”
Messi turned on the style in the second
half, with a few pieces of skill and runs from deep turning the Ahmad bin Ali
Stadium into a raucous venue. Ferdinand was among the fans cheering him on.
“Honestly if we had a camera in here, the
way we were jumping up and down,” he added. “I’ve lost my voice screaming how
is he doing this?
“He’s embarrassing players but with his head up. You know a player goes through a cluster of players their head’s down usually, but he’s taking people on and seeing the pitch, his spacial awareness is phenomenal.”
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