Lionel Messi Walked His Way Through El Clasico

At this point trying to describe just how good Lionel Messi is is like trying to describe why Pigs in Blankets are the best food at Christmas, they just are. But one stat shows how little effort he puts in to be so great.

Right now in Spain they've all been able to really enjoy their turkey, stuffing and sprouts, if that's their kind of thing, as they get to embrace the joys of a winter break.

Before acting like school kids on their Christmas jollys La Liga finished with Barcelona hammering Real Madrid 3-0 at the Bernabeu and giving themselves a 14 point lead over their rivals.

_{Barcelona players celebrate beating Real. Image: PA Images.}

Luis Suarez opened the scoring in the second half, Daniel Carvajal handled on the line and Messi put away the penalty, for once, and Aleix Vidal rounded off the scoring.

After grabbing one and setting up the third Messi was unsurprisingly given the Man of the Match award but he barely had to put any effort in to beating Los Blancos.

According to El Periodico the five time Ballon d'Or winner spent a huge amount of the match literally walking with only 6.1% of his match spent doing more than jogging:

_{Messi walked for 83.10% of the match. Image: PA Images.}

The stats say that the Argentine forward ran for less than four and a half minutes of the match whilst his sprinting time was even less, at about one minute of the 90.

Messi's impressive stats didn't end their though. The 30 year old had six successful dribbles in the match which was three times more than the opposition as a whole managed, and he probably walked them.

Barca's superstar also created more chances than Real did as a team, he was pretty good on Saturday.

_{Messi presumably just walking at the Real defence. Image: PA Images.}

Barca now have a nine point lead over Atletico Madrid in second place but more importantly it's a 14 point head start over Real when the second half of the season kicks off.

Messi just seems to get better and better though, maybe he'll finally really do it at a World Cup in the summer.

Topics: El Clasico, Barcelona, Lionel Messi, Spain, Real Madrid, 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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