Lionel Messi Makes Las Palmas Goalkeeper Look Foolish

Playing a La Liga game in front of an empty Camp Nou is certainly out of the ordinary. On the other hand something that is completely normal is Lionel Messi making an opposition goalkeeper look silly, and that's exactly what he did on Sunday.

With violence between police and civilians in Barcelona due to the Catalan independence referendum it looked for a while that FC Barcelona wouldn't be playing against Las Palmas on Sunday.

However the league wouldn't postpone the match so it had to go ahead however the club decided that they would play the match behind closed doors, leading to the very strange situation of no fans being inside the stadium.

_{Shit ground no fans? An eerily quiet Camp Nou. Image: PA}

Despite the lack of any fans Lionel Messi was still up for entertaining those watching from the comfort of the houses as he scored a brace in Barca's 3-0 win over Las Palmas.

His first, and the team's second, came on 70 minutes when the little Argentinian made the goalkeeper look very foolish. His extra touch made the keeper swipe at thin air as Messi took the ball round him:

Leandro Chichizola isn't the first goalkeeper that Messi has left with egg on his face and he certainly won't be the last but that won't exactly please the Las Palmas number one.

Seven minutes later the 30 year old was scoring his 11th La Liga goal of the season as Barcelona continued their unbeaten record in the league at the start of the season, in a season where most expected them to struggle since the departure of Neymar to PSG.

_{Messi celebrates his second goal as Barca continued their excellent form under Ernesto Valverde and keep the pressure on underperforming Real Madrid. Image: PA}

Whilst Messi's goals were far from rare the lack of fans was a blow to Sergio Busquets who scored a rather rare goal. Despite playing his entire career in midfield for Barca the Spaniard has only scored 13 goals in 443 games.

The players certainly would have been doing it for the fans who were locked out of the Camp Nou.

Topics: Barcelona, Lionel Messi, Las Palmas, La Liga

Ryan Sidle

Ryan is a writer for SPORTbible. He covers all sport from football, formula one, cricket, rugby, tennis, athletics, mma and wrestling. He obviously hates YOUR football team and has no interest in synchronised swimming.

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